Autistic siblings' canine calendar

By lbishop

United by a love of dogs and photography two autistic siblings have worked together to make a special canine calendar.

Joseph and Zoe Stoneham, who are 12 and 10 respectively, from Bookham designed and produced a calendar featuring different dogs from the village for each month.

The siblings, who both have Asperger's syndrome, which impairs their communication and social skills, are home-schooled by their mother, Tracy Stoneham, who set them the task of producing the calendar.

Mrs Stoneham, of Church Road, explained: "As part of their home education I believe it is important to do an annual project to raise funds and awareness for a good cause."

It was decided to do a Bookham Barkers calendar for next year comprised of local dogs that they had seen while walking on the Bookham Commons.

Joseph, a keen photographer, took most of the pictures while his sister, a dog fanatic, wrote the words for the calendar and designed the layout.

Explaining how he got the dogs in the photos, Joseph said: "I showed people my photos and gave a flyer out to them and then whenever I got a chance I would take a photo of the dog."

Zoe added: "We had to get all the pictures of the dogs and then find out something about them and then choose what month we were going to give each dog."

Included among the dogs featured in the calendar are the siblings' own pets Bailey, a Labrador, and Rockee, a German shepherd.

Because each calendar takes 30 minutes to make the Stonehams have limited the first print run to 500 copies being sold for a minimum donation of £5 each.

The money raised by the calendar will be going towards the National Autistic Society which Mrs Stoneham says has proved a boon to the family in the past.

"The National Autistic Society helped with advice and contact numbers and most importantly provided another person to bounce ideas off when things got very confused," she said.

The official launch of the calendar took place at The Snack Bar at Bookham Railway Station last Friday.