Activities at Oaklands Care Home
Our home is always full of life, and we can thank our wonderful Activities Coordinators for this. Dedication to creating a unique and interesting activities programme is what sets us apart from other homes. We always take into consideration that some people would prefer to pursue their own interests, which is why our team strive to incorporative activities that cater to a wide range of tastes and hobbies. Our trips out are always fun and exciting as well, and residents are guaranteed to return with stories to tell their loved ones!
Anna Bate & Jo Lawn
Anna is our Activity Lead. She started working at Barchester over 14 years ago at our sister home Hilton Park. Having built strong relationships with staff, residents and families, Anna brings lots of fun to our home. Anna loves to sing, dance and laugh and generally brings oodles of joy to ours days.
Working alongside Anna is Jo who started her career here at Oaklands as a carer on Elms community in 2014 developing a passion for dementia care and completing her social care N+VQ Levels 2 and 3. Jo Joined the activity team 3 years ago and has since become the homes dementia champion, championing for a better lifestyle for our resident through staff training and regular audits.
Activities and Events Partnerships
As part of our bespoke life-enrichment programmes, we host a number of live virtual events in the home on a regular basis through a number of partnerships with places of interest and world class performance companies
Life at Oaklands Care Home
Just two men sitting in the sunshine at the riverside
We had a marvellous trip out to the Ely riverbank to catch up with the local fishermen, as both Keith and Ray have been keen fishermen all their lives.
We all enjoyed the surroundings we were in, the sun was shining and reflecting off the water, and it was just gorgeous.
We enjoyed the walk up and down the river chatting to the locals and seeing what they had caught. Sadly, only one of the fishermen Dave had caught, which we found funny, as it annoyed the others and some were packing up to go and find a better spot.
We took some time to look around and could see the Cathedral in the distance. We had a great morning and look forward to going again.
Reflections
We took some time and will continue to take time over the next few days to sit and reflect with our residents and, instead of making new year's resolutions, we make new year wishes.
This gives our residents a chance to express their wishes, however big or small.
As you can see from the photos, some of these are gorgeous wishes, and we look forward to granting them over the next few months.
New Year at Oaklands
We had a fabulous celebration of New Year's Eve and New Year's Day with sparklers in the gardens for those that wished, and then we had glow in the dark balloons which were great fun for all as we played games and created laughter.
Residents enjoyed a glass of fizz to toast the New Year and music from Kirsty helped us to celebrate on New Year’s Day.
Moorea said her fizz was “delicious” and Judy danced the day away.
Visit from Bambi
We were fortunate to have Bambi the coachhorse visit us at this special time of the year dressed in her festive outfit to bring pure joy to our residents, as you can see from the photos Bambi is able to go everywhere into rooms for our residents that are cared for in bed and even in the lift to visits residents living upstairs.
Bambi brightens up everyone’s day: residents, families and staff.
Jane has always had horses from being a child and found it amazing that Bambi was inside and she gave her a very good pat and stroke.
We look forward to seeing Bambi in the new year and wonder what colour her hooves will be!!!
Annual Christmas Fayre
We held our annual Christmas fayre last Friday evening enjoying local stall holders and the chance to shop with our loved ones.
We were joined at the end of the evening with the Bottisham Scouts who sang some of their traditional songs and some beautiful carols to get us in the Christmas spirit.
Busy Boards
A new favourite at Oaklands which has proven popular with our gentlemen is the busy boards giving them an opportunity to be busy whilst still being manly.
The boards offer a variety of interactive buttons, switches, lights and screws.
The resident has to use their hand eye co-ordination to screw in screws and tighten the bolts and turn the keys and it has given our gentleman great satisfaction whilst having fun and keeping busy.
