How did this start?

From personal experience (see our story below), we realised that there are insufficient safe recreational outdoor facilities for those experiencing physical, mental, intellectual or emotional challenges.

Our vision is to leave a garden legacy in perpetuity for the benefit of the wider community. Our faith in a compassionate God compels us to look after those that society would prefer to hide or even ignore.

A rural garden or sanctuary could provide that physical and emotionally safe space and at the same time be a calm and relaxing environment to breathe fresh air and enjoy connecting with nature away from the bustle and busyness of a town or city. We must not forget the carers and families, who may also like to feel at ease in a space that has been created to meet everyone's physical, mental, intellectual and emotional needs.

Our story and experiences with Mark

We adopted our intellectually disabled son, Mark, in 1989  at age 7 while we were living in England.  He subsequently moved with us and our 2 biological daughters to California in 1993.  He lived with us full time until age 14 when we could no longer meet his full time care needs, at which point he moved into residential care.  Since then, he has remained in full time care in California making the choice to remain in California and not to move with us to Australia.  He has a sister who lives nearby and visits him regularly, often taking one or two of her children with her. Mark enjoys garden activities with his fellow clients at his group home.

It had been a dream of ours for many years to return home to Victoria upon retirement and buy some acreage.  The question of what we would do with this land gradually morphed into gardening of some description.  From there it was only a short step to fulfilling our passion of leaving a legacy by providing facilities for people like Mark.  This idea expanded to include people of all disabilities. 

Over the years, we have been very aware that there is a shortage of suitable, safe places that we could take Mark for an outing or entertainment.  Residential homes, day programs and families are sometimes limited by the lack of appropriate recreation spaces for their clients or relatives. Many times shopping centres become the only places to visit for the lack of other facilities more specific for their needs.  It could be argued that taking intellectually or physically disabled clients to a shopping centre helps them to learn interactive and socialisation skills.  While interaction and socialisation are important, from our personal observation of such groups in shopping centres, this seldom happens.  This may be for many different reasons including reluctance on the part of the general public to engage with the disabled.   Many times, the disabled themselves may not have the physical, behavioral or intellectual capacity to engage with strangers. 

Through conversation with parents and relatives with intellectually disabled or special needs family members here in Australia, we find that there is a similar lack of appropriate facilities in this country.  Thus was born the idea of creating a garden or sanctuary suitable for people of all ages and abilities to enjoy, learn and recreate together.

Comments

Diana Bucknall ~ Jun 10, 2020

This is an amazing project and one which should be replicated at many sites the world over. Hopefully it might stir others in this direction. All the very best wishes for the success of this project.