As 2021 comes to an end its time to reflect on how the year has gone.

The past year for Fine and Dandi has been a fantastic one. We didn’t expect things to have progressed at the rate in which they have but the year has been fantastic, and we head into 2022 looking to develop and improve things even more.

We started the year by raising awareness and after looking to run an article with things took an unexpected turn in direction. In April this year Fine and Dandi was setup as a charity (limited by Guarantee) as we had a very kind offer by Gavin Fell to do some fundraising for Fine and Dandi that would allow us to raise more awareness around mental health, diversity and inclusion.

Since that moment Fine and Dandi has gone from strength to strength we’ve had several people who have raised money for us and we’ve been able to raise over £1700 that has helped us so far and will help us further as we head into 2022.

We owe a huge thank you to Gavin Fell who has done various walking, cycling (300 miles in May) and swimming challenges in 2021, Mark Spendiff who walked 100 miles in June, Steven White who walked 50 mile in one week in May as well as 100 miles in 28 days in July followed by climbing Helvellyn, Jake and Josh White who planned on walking 50 miles in August and ended up doing just under 100 and also Marie Butler who capped the fundraising off perfectly for 2021 by running the Great North Run in September.

As well as fundraising we have been working behind the scenes and have formed a partnership with the Whitley Bay Barbarians and Steven has become the clubs mental health first aider. We have our logo featured across all Barbarian playing kits and are looking to build the partnership even further in 2022, stay tuned for updates on that one.

In 2021 Fine and Dandi became a sponsor for Spennymoor Town midfielder Jamie Chandler. Jamie is someone we have known for a number of years and had recently overcome a serious injury to get back to playing during a challenging time with the pandemic. Things have been challenging for us all and Jamie showed the type of person he is during these testing times and it felt only right that we support him during the 2021/22 season with Spennymoor. Jamie is a great person and a good footballer to boot. The one good thing to see from the challenges Jamie has faced is the smile on his face now he is back playing the sport he loves.

We’d like to thank everyone who has bought t-shirts, hoodies, caps, hats, snoods, body warmers and water bottles, your support is very much appreciated and its great to see pictures of you wearing merchandize with pride and helping us raise awareness. If you would like to support us you can buy our merchandise from our online shop.

We’ve had a great 2021 when looking back and we sit in a nice position as we head into 2022. What we do need however is as much support as possible, we would love to hear from as many people as possible to make Fine and Dandi even bigger and better than it is at present. We would like to speak to everyone who has ideas for us to improve online and offline, anyone who would like to share their journey with us and anyone who is considering doing some fund raising in 2022, whether it’s a New Year challenge, climbing a mountain or running a (half) marathon we would love to hear from you and support you with your challenges.

We can all work together to raise awareness around mental health, diversity and inclusion and show people that its okay to not be okay and more importantly it’s okay to ask for help.

We have things in the pipeline for 2022 and will post more when time allows but for now, here are a selection of images from 2021 for you to look back over and here is to a fantastic 2022 for you all.

Thank you all for the support and all the very best for 2022