PORTLAND HOUSE PARENT CHRISTMAS NEWSLETTER 2025

Dear parents

As we are fast approaching the festive period I would like to take this opportunity to wish all our lovely families a very 'Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!’ with the very best of wishes and good health for 2026 year ahead from myself the Portland House Team.

We have had a magical time during December bringing sparkle and curiosity into our daily learning and adventures and not forgetting a surprise visit from Santa who popped into to see the children  at their Christmas parties and brought a lovely gift for each of the children.

We have been very fortunate to have our parents participate in our children’s learning experiences. The children have enjoyed numerous visits this year from a wide variety of parents and relatives, reading stories, sharing of their knowledge and job roles, interests, hobbies and celebrations have been a valuable enrichment to the children’s learning opportunities and allow us to continue to work together to strengthen our parent partnerships. We hope to see many more of you invited into the nursery during the upcoming year ahead.

Diary Dates

The nursery will be closed on Thursday 25th December 2025 and will reopen on Friday 2nd January 2026. For children who attend term time the sessions will resume week commencing Monday 5th January 2026.

Friday 3rd April 2026 – Monday 6th April 2026 - Nursery Closed Easter Bank Holiday

Closed FRIDAY 24th APRIL 2026 – STAFF TRAINING DAY 
Spring Staff training day
We will be closed on Friday 24th April 2026 for our Spring staff training day, as you are aware staff training and development is vital to ensure that Portland nurseries provide the highest standard of care for children and families. We appreciate your understanding in the importance of closing the nursery for a day to ensure that the staff have the most up to date training.

Monday 4th May 2026 – Nursery Closed bank holiday

Monday 25th May 2026 – Nursery Closed Bank holiday

Monday 31st August 2026 – Nursery Closed summer bank holiday

January upcoming events
Monday 5th January – Issac Newton’s Birthday, children at nursery will be exploring gravity.
Tuesday 13th January – Lohri, children will be leaning about the Punjabi festival which celebrates the passing of the winter solstice.
Friday 23rd January – the big garden birdwatch, children will be looking out for birds and identifying different birds we see in the garden.
Monday 26th January – Burn’s night, children will be learning about the Scottish celebration.
Thursday 29th January – National puzzle day – children will be completing many different puzzles at nursery.

Staff News

Congratulations to Alannah and Alistair who got married in December and enjoyed their special day celebrations.
Also huge congratulations to Danni in the baby room who is celebrating her recent engagement.

Longevity Awards

Clara celebrated her 20 years milestone working with Portland Nurseries and was showered with gifts, cards, flowers and extra days holiday in recognition for her continuous hard work in which she has had the opportunity to nurture many children and build strong bonds with families over these years. We are all super proud of you Clara.

We have also celebrated 5 Years Long Service for Alannah in November, thank you for all your dedication and unwavering hard work. 

Portland Nurseries Annual Awards

We recently held our annual awards night where all the nurseries across the Portland group enjoyed an evening celebration reflecting upon achievements of the previous academic year. This is a lovely opportunity for us to celebrate staff members achievements, qualifications over this period and thank them for the dedication, passion and talent as they strive to support all our families in our nurseries. 

We are delighted to announce that the Early years educator of the year was awarded to Alannah the team leader of  babies 1 and the rising star award went to Caitlan one of our amazing teachers in preschool. Huge congratulations to both of these wonderful staff members for being the well deserved winners of 2025.

Warm Welcomes

We have recently welcomed Arabella in preschool and Sally into toddlers whom have both joined us to start their Apprenticeship journey soon to be embarking on their training for their level 3 early educators qualification. We also have welcomed an Apprentice Ruby for part of her induction training, she will be moving to Oakwood House in January.
A big hello to Tilly who has also moved from Harlequin and enjoying spending time in the preschool.

Charity

Our new charity is Ruddi's Retreat - a growing charity that helps families affected by cancer or life limiting illnesses. They send families on holiday to one of their beautiful caravans situated in the UK and since the charity began they have helped over 4000 families all over the UK.

The spirit of giving has ricochet throughout the nurseries enabling us to come together to help the charities through a variety of events, by giving a little to help others less fortunate and spreading Christmas cheer. The harvest collection for the wellbeing Centre was highly successful and we are currently raising funds over the next year for our nominated local charity ‘ Rudi’s retreat.  

The charity wreath making event that was held at Portland was a great success and raised in excess of £400, it enabled parents across all the nurseries and relatives to try out new skills, meet new people and create some spectacular festive wreaths to don their doors at home. It would be lovely to see you at this event next year.

Thank you to everyone who has joined in with wearing their festive jumper for the current charity fundraising event. Tickets for the Christmas raffle this will be drawn week commencing Monday 22nd December. If you have not yet bought any tickets and would like some there is still opportunity to purchase them please message/speak to your child’s key person

Learning focus at the moment

Babies 1

The babies have had a wonderful time getting festive in the month of December exploring all the sensory experiences this season brings, from dancing to festive music, enjoying circle times learning new rhymes and Christmas songs and stories, to making marvellous creations of art work and baubles for their Christmas tree to take home for the festive period. Parents and children enjoyed a fun filled festive stay and play raising a little money for charity too.

Babies 2

Throughout December the babies have been joining in with lots of fun activities. They have been having great fun in the garden, playing in a variety of weather's; rain, wind, sun and the refreshing cold. They have been getting very festive by playing and exploring with a range of festive materials, such as, tinsel. Draping it over themselves for a full body experience. They have played with a 'Portland Express' themed tuff tray and enjoyed a delicious festive lunch. The babies have had a few baby discos too; the lights were off, the light projector on and music playing. They had balloons out too. It has been a lot of fun had by all.

Toddlers 

In the toddler room we had a enjoyed a fun filled Christmassy day we had a go making our own collage Christmas cards for family members. The children have been taking part in activities including festive playdough using tools and leaves to print with and making some pretend hot chocolate with the sand using spoons, cups, cotton wool for the cream and pom poms as marshmallows. We also explored the artic animals tray, read stories and had a lots of fun with the balloons hitting them into the air and trying to catch them. Hope you have a very Merry Christmas and a happy new year! See you in 2026!

Preschool 

Preschool have loved participating in lots of fun activities in December. This month we have explored our creative side with many different Christmas crafts. The children also did a great job of decorating our preschool room and Christmas tree to make it feel more like Christmas! Most importantly, the children most enjoyed delivering two carol concerts for our parents to come in and see. The children helped to make all decorations for the occasion and made sure their singing voices were switched on no matter the weather. This past week preschool have enjoyed coming in and discovering what our elf has been up to in the night and adapting our play around the elf’s activities. To conclude the festivities, the children then enjoyed a delicious Christmas dinner and pudding with their friends.

Other information

Recycling activity

To beat the January blues when you have a New Year detox from your Christmas holiday décor we would welcome any of your unwanted or left over festive bits and bobs such as old Christmas decorations, used cards, wrapping paper, tinsel baubles etc for our upcoming recycling craft project that we will be doing with the children in the New Year. Please bring them  into to nursery after the holidays in January 2026.

As we enjoy the last few nursery days of 2025 we look forward to seeing you joining in with adventures in the year ahead with many exciting events in the planning which details will be available in the next newsletter. Thank you for all the generous festive gifts and cards that you have given the staff team of which we are all extremely appreciative.