Our lovely Lifestyle and Wellbeing lead Sarah plans each week, with a focus on activities loved and requested by residents. She also encourages those who don’t feel that they can do things, often resulting in a huge sense of achievement. Sometimes it can be more about the time together than the activity – lots of fun conservations which often go off on a tangent!
Here is a snapshot of a week at Abberton.
We begin the week with Messy and Moving Mondays!
Time for some messy craft. The feel of different materials and mediums is important and we all have plastic bibs to contain the mess! We have, over the last few weeks, made salt dough Easter decorations. We made the salt dough, rolled it and chose Easter cutters to make the shapes. Then they were baked and residents individually painted them. Next they will be hung on our Easter tree, or given as gifts to family. We have also made and decorated Easter bonnets.
Monday afternoons is time for some seated chair exercise. We always have such fun with Gunni from Kiddleydivey who puts together amazing musical workouts. Check out a video here https://www.facebook.com/abbertonmanor/videos/3078925762238191
Tuesday is Cooking Club
Sarah is learning so much from our residents about baking – all their top tips, favourite recipes and how to not weigh any ingredients but still get a great mixture! We have some star bakers here and sharing our bakes gives such a sense of achievement. So far we have baked shortbread, muffins and cinnamon swirls to name a few. For Nutrition and Hydration week residents created their own mocktails and made fruit kebabs.
Wednesday – mid week pampering
Everyone loves a Wednesday (even more so when the spring sun is shining). Jo, our lovely hairdresser comes each week to ensure our lovely residents have that salon hair feeling. Our ladies especially enjoy having their nails painted and a bit of pampering
Fun-filled Fridays
Friday is generally the day we have entertainers into our home or host larger themed events.
For International Women’s Day we hosted an Abberton Manor Ladies Afternoon Tea. We are very privileged to have so many wonderful ladies. Just some of the words used today were skilled, adventurous, travelled, creative, kind, caring, clever, home makers, bakers, seamstress and supportive.
For Comic Relief Friday everyone wore red, we had a special menu and played lots of games. Who would have thought Abberton Manor residents and staff would be so competitive!!
For National French Language Day we have had great fun trying French cuisine (no snails though!) and a French Quiz. We have very talented chefs (merci beau!) and well travelled/adventurous residents.
Other activities each week
Pen pals: We have set up a pen pal exchange with a care home in Cornwall. We started by choosing and writing some postcards of Colchester and are looking forward to receiving some replies.
Gardening Club: Green fingered residents spent an afternoon planting flower seeds. Everything from nasturtiums, to sunflowers, forget-me-nots and sweet peas. We are nurturing the seedlings and hope to have a riot of flowers and the heady scent of sweet peas through our home in the summer.
Floristry: Thank you to Waitrose of Colchester for donating the flowers for our regular floristry club. Residents always make such beautiful arrangements.
