In September every year, Fingal County Council runs the Howth Maritime and Seafood Festival. This is a great day out with lots of free family fun, live music and the chance to support local businesses.
In 2024, on the weekend of 7th and 8th September, we had our own stand provided by Fingal County Council along with a Quiet Zone and quiet W.C.
Our objectives in having the stand were to educate the community about autism, promote ourselves as a new organisation, and generate an interest in the Autism Champions programme.
We certainly achieved these aims, with a constant stream of visitors reading through our posters explaining what autism is, testing and touching the sensory equipment on our sensory table and picking up leaflets and information on the information table.
We had queues of people- parents and immediate family members of autistic people, extended family members, autistic adults, teenagers and children, colleagues, neighbours, friends and organisations all wanting to ask us questions. There were 3 of us on the stand most of the time, but we could probably have doubled that number and still been busy.
Many people wanted to buy the sensory toys and equipment, so that’s food for thought for next year.
We also wanted to ensure that the festival was inclusive for autistic visitors, so we were delighted when Fingal Events agreed to provide a quiet space and a whole bunch of sensory equipment and tools, including 20 bean bags! We helped them create a visual guide which they put out on social media. Samantha O Flanagan worked like a trooper all weekend, managing the Quiet Zone, with support also from Fingal Volunteers. It was truly wonderful to see it being used by both children and adults who needed a space to decompress and self-regulate.
In 2025, we intend to participate again, and our plan is to add a means for visitors to purchase some of the sensory tools.
