Sunshine, Sea & Smiles: Our Summer with Karbon Homes’ Holiday Squad

This summer, Creative Kitchen had the absolute pleasure of joining Karbon Homes’ amazing Holiday Squad, a much-loved programme that brings children and families together during the school holidays for fun, food, and shared experiences.

The Holiday Squad is a free initiative organised by Karbon Homes, offering a wide range of enriching, inclusive activities for primary school-aged children across the region. With a focus on creativity, movement, learning, and play, the programme is open to all children and includes SEND-friendly sessions and support so everyone can get involved. It’s all about creating welcoming spaces where children can explore new things, make new friends, and leave with great memories.

We’re really proud to be part of something that makes such a difference to our community. This summer, we brought our own special twist to the programme with “Seaside Adventure!” a series of hands-on, food-filled workshops designed to capture the fun and freedom of a day at the beach.

Our Creative Kitchen Sessions: A Seaside Adventure

This year, we brought the sunshine to four fantastic venues across County Durham:

• Dipton Jubilee Centre

• Delves Lane Village Hall

• The Activity Den at Tanfield

• Bullion Hall

Each venue became a little slice of the seaside, welcoming children aged 5–11 for a morning packed with cooking, crafts, and beach-themed games.

During our jam packed sessions we created our own beachside lunches, from seaside smiles to sandcastle pudding cups and the children loved getting involved and making recipes they could proudly recreate at home.

We got hands-on with a variety of seaside-themed crafts, from decorating shells to creating windmills and boats. It was wonderful to see everyone’s creativity shine as they explored under-the-sea and coastal-inspired projects.

To burn off some of that excitement, we played energetic beach games, from crab crawl relays to “stuck in the sand” and obstacle courses, keeping everyone active and having fun.

Throughout the session, we refuelled with healthy snacks, because no seaside adventure is complete without something tasty to keep you going!

The Best Part

Each session had such a great buzz from the moment the doors opened. The children came in full of energy and got stuck in straight away, whether it was mixing up their beachside lunches, layering sandcastle pudding cups, or racing each other in a seaside game. It was lovely to see them chatting, helping each other out, and just enjoying being part of it all.

None of this would be possible without the brilliant work of Karbon Homes and their partners. 

We’re already thinking about what we can bring to the next Holiday Squad programme.

Here’s to a summer well spent, and many more to come!