MINI-VINNIES 2023-24

     The Society of St. Vincent de Paul  has been engaging with young people and education since its earliest days. Mini Vinnies are children aged between 7 - 11 who, with permission of their parents and the support of their schools, are encouraged to embark on their first steps as possible "Vincentians for Life" as Mini Vinnies.

During the Lenten Term the Mini Vinnies have worked together to make Crowns of Thorns for each class to use on their class altars. The Crown of thorns (made out of salt dough) was a gift to everyone in our school family to help us think about the sacrifices Jesus made for us and to remind us to make little sacrifices for him as a sign of our love for Him.

The youngsters have their own treasured prayer, pledge and badge which guide them in their formative steps - helping and enabling them to become in every sense, Mini Vinnies!

Our group of Mini Vinnies meet weekly to pray, discuss concerns they may have and to plan events to help live out the motto 'Turning concern to action '.

For the launch of the month of the Holy Rosary - In October - we have begun collecting prayer intentions from staff and pupils which we pray for during our weekly meetings. (Remember the 'blue' intentions box can be found just outside the dining hall.) 

Class Prayer Books – Term 3 2022

After discussing different ways the group could contribute to the school, the Mini Vinnies and the Prayer group decided to join forces to produce prayer books for each class in preparation for Lent. The children took great care with this project and even gave up several of their lunchtimes to complete the books. You can see some examples of their fantastic work in the photos below.

Each class prayer book contains the prayers that the children will learn in that year group. Children will also be given the opportunity to add their own prayers to their books throughout the year.

Christmas Cards – Term 2 2022

The Mini Vinnies invited all pupils to take the time to create a handmade Christmas card for an elderly member of the Parish community. A great big thank you to all those who contributed to this event. 

All those who received the Christmas cards were very touched by this gesture of kindness.

Introducing the Mini Vinnies of 2021-22!

The Mini Vinnies have been busy this year working on a range of projects this term. We will be sharing updates on their exciting projects here throughout the year. So keep checking back to see their latest ventures!

Christmas Tea

We welcomed some of the sisters from Our Lady of the Missions from Sturry to have some tea and Christmas treats with some of our Mini-Vinnie's. We sang some Christmas carols and sahred stories about what we do here in school. We took the sisters on a tour of the school. 

Mini Vinnie's in 2019...

2019 is going to be an important year for Mini Vinnie's here at St Thomas'. We are going to be more active than ever around school. Not only we will be continuing our weekly meetings but we will be working together to host a couple of events here is school. We have had lots of ideas and are working hard to make these happen. One of these will be to welcome our parishioners from St Thomas' Church here into school for an afternoon where we can get together and chat over tea and a few biscuits. The other will be for children here in school to take part in.

Watch this space.....

What a Wonderful Year!

Well we have reached the end of another successful year in the Mini-Vinnie's. We have enjoyed our weekly meetings where we share in the Lord's Word and think about how we can make a change in people's lives.

We have been planning ahead to next year, we want to get out into our community. So watch this space...

Here are some pictures of our lovely group:

Coffee Afternoon - January 2017

On Tuesday 24th January 2017 our Mini-Vinnie's group welcomed some parishioners from our Church to school for a coffee afternoon. We had a lovely afternoon, the children were chatting to those who came, serving them tea, coffee and biscuits. It was enjoyed by all who came and all the children also loved every minute. We would like to thank those people from our parish who came and donated £48, the Mini-Vinnie's will decide next week at our meeting who they would like to donate the money to. We can't wait for the next event with our parishioners in summer!

Afternoon Tea for the parishioners

Our Mini Vinnie's group organised afternoon tea for some of our parishioners. The children served cakes and drinks to the parishioners. The children really enjoyed it and so did the parishioners. It was a wonderful occasion, which we cannot wait to do again.

Welcome to Mini-Vinnies!

We are a new group in school that are linked with the St. Vincent de Paul Society (SVP), we are the youngest members of this international society. Each week we come together to share in a time of prayer and reflection. Our main ambition is to turn concern into action by raising awareness about people who may be less fortunate than ourselves. All the children volunteered to be part of this exciting new group and we are very proud of each and every one of them.

At our very first meeting held on Monday 2^nd March 2015 we discussed the roles we will have in the group including a president, vice-president, secretary, treasurer and a spiritual advisor. We are going to hold a vote for each of these roles as we had several candidates for each post, so watch this space!