Continuing its long relationship with Rays of Sunshine charity, Clinton Cards is helping to spread some much-needed Christmas magic to seriously ill children and their families this year.
The retailer’s annual Christmas card competition saw hundreds of entries flood in from the children and families involved with the Rays of Sunshine charity (which uses its funds to grants wishes and provide ongoing support for those in hospital and within the community).
This year’s winning designs came from budding young artists, Sienna, aged nine from Nottingham, with a festive snowman, and Izabelle, aged 10 from Kent, with a reindeer design.
Sienna said that the reason she wanted to design a Christmas card was to “make people happy”. Sienna has been diagnosed with Neuroblastoma and is currently living with Cardio Myopathy, a disease which makes it harder for your heart to pump blood around the body. Rays of Sunshine granted her greatest wish to go to Disney World in Florida with her family in 2016.
The other winning design came from Izabelle, whose said that her reindeer design came about as she wanted to replicate her favourite thing about Christmas, which is spending time with her friends and family. Izabelle’s sister Amelia, who was diagnosed with a brain tumour in 2013, had her greatest wish granted by Rays of Sunshine to go to CBeebies Land.
The cards are on sale at Clintons (in stores and online), with 15% of the proceeds going to the charity, and what’s more the winners’ were invited to a special trip to a store to see their printed designs on display.
As Nicola Miller, buying director at Clintons, said: “As this challenging year comes to an end, people are excited to celebrate in the spirit of Christmas, however that may look this holiday season. We are incredibly proud to be supporting Rays of Sunshine and believe that this year the competition is particularly poignant as so many families, friends and loved ones have been kept apart from each other due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Sending Christmas cards is one of the few ways of communicating handwritten heartfelt messages to those we can’t see and we know that these beautifully designed cards by Sienna and Izabelle are sure to put a smile on everyone’s faces.”
Top: Clintons is offering the Rays of Sunshine charity Christmas cards in store and online.
