Today we had our Christmas Party. We had a very good attendance, about 12 of our members plus 8 members with their carers, from Aarandale care home in Mill Hill. Also attending were 3 members of the Rotary Club, 3 from the Church plus Lisa and Mark.
Mince pies, biscuits, tea and coffee were given to all the members to start the Christmas celebrations. The session started with Lisa welcoming everyone and providing a Christmas picture quiz where members had to guess from the picture the Christmas film titles. They also had some Christmas word search too which was given out by Faz.
This kept everyone busy and created a lot of discussion on each table. The session then continued with the usual chair yoga by Richard. Richard always makes exercising interesting but also great fun.
The yoga was followed by our new music entertainer Aaron, who replaces James. This was Aaron’s first performance for our Dementia Club, and everybody enjoyed his singing. Aaron sang some very popular songs which made most members get up and dance. We also had birthday celebrations, and everybody sang happy birthday to them. Aaron then started a music quiz and had prepared 10 music quiz songs to ask members to identify the songs and singers by playing a few seconds. If they guessed them correctly then they were asked to throw the large fluffy dice. As usual someone would keep the points and some cheating to get a six on the dice is sometimes necessary. The members enjoyed themselves by getting a lot of points and this now sets a challenge for other dementia clubs.
Thank you to our church volunteer Dorothy and Sue for making teas and coffees and Andrew for setting up the venue. Thank you also to our Rotarians from Barnet; John, Jim and Malcolm. Also, many thanks to Lisa and Mark for their continuous support making the Dementia Club at St John’s Church successful.
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Lisa was arriving late today as she had to go to The BBC to do some voice recording for the film that will be shown in the new year.
Our two Trustees Mark and Valerie who is also a Rotarian had to lead the session. There were 25 members who attended today. This new venue is becoming one of the favourites for members as it is so welcoming. The fireplace with the heat blasting out and the lovely finger sandwiches and cakes and biscuits and tea pots and fresh coffee is such a treat especially when it is also served with a smile.
Unfortunately Ami today was not there as she was ill with the flu but her mum Sarah was there with Becky another family member. Valerie welcomed everyone and Mark also explained why Lisa was going to be late. Valerie then talked to members about Chanukah which starts on the 23rd December. Members were very interested.
Mark then started a quiz with everyone which was prepared by Lisa. The questions were based on television Soaps. At that moment Lisa walked in and members were eager to hear about the BBC before Mark carried on with the quiz.
After the quiz, it was time for exercises with Eon. Eon’s first job is spacing the chairs out for members. Members always enjoy the workout with Eon and this also prepares them when the music entertainer Ian James arrives. Everyone is warmed up and ready to dance.
Ian played mostly Christmas songs today and everyone did a lot of dancing. It was an enjoyable afternoon. A few members also decided to played some table football. Thank you today to Valerie and Mark for leading the session, thank you also to Rotarians Dick, Sheila, Kuljit and his wife Satwan. It was lovely to also see Risom today – a volunteer from one of the previous venues.
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Today was both sad and happy as it was James Le Bec - our music entertainer’s last performance but it was also a Christmas party organised by Annalisa who is GLL Barnet Community Sports Officer.
The area near the cafeteria was soon set up and Annalisa made sure the teas/coffees were ready to serve to members as they arrived.
Muz had prepared some word searches and quizzes and handed them out on each table. So as members arrived, they were kept busy as they were enjoying their teas/coffees and cakes.
Lisa then welcomed everyone and introduced Annalisa to start the session. Annalisa organised her group of dance ladies today to perform a few popular dances like ‘Singing in the Rain’. Members enjoyed watching the dance ladies perform and also sang along.
The dancing then followed with Tombola. A game similar to bingo was played and the winning prizes were; a Session with a massage therapist, a consultation with Sandra who is a personal fitness trainer and a free pass for some classes and some Aloe Vera products. There were 2 winners in this game and Annalisa asked them to come to the front and collect their prizes.
Well done to all the ladies who took part and well done especially to Annalisa who trained and prepared the group for today and also preparing the Tombola. Lisa thanked all the ladies individually.
The session then followed with James le Bec who started with some Christmas songs and Annalisa had also prepared copies of the song lyrics which helped and everyone sang along. It was then time for James’s quiz questions and as usual members really love this part trying to guess the song title or artist. They like the challenge as they need to score high points to beat a previous score achieved from another group.
Each person who gets the correct answer also gets to throw the red dice and that is also great fun as a few of the carers try to tackle to make sure the dice lands on number six. James then played some music favourites which got some members up dancing and even doing the Conga dance. Everyone is very sad to see James go and all wished him and his partner Joy who always helps during the session the best of luck for the future.
The session was a great success – thanks to Annalisa for organising this session. Thank you today to Annalisa for all her hard work making this Christmas party a success. Thank you to all the cafeteria team who helped with the teas/coffees Thank you to Chris Parker – General Manager for Barnet Copthall Leisure Centre for his support and making sure everything was running smoothly. Thank you to Muz from Ping is King Ltd for his quizzes and also helping throughout the session. It was also lovely to meet his mum Sharifa and his dad Faiz who also enjoyed the session. Thank you also to Mark one of the Trustees who also helped throughout the session.
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Whilst Mark was at Brent Cross Lisa was busy setting up for the dementia club and as usual it was a very busy session.
Lisa had to set up the tables and chairs by herself today but she was happy to see a few of the volunteers arrive later. Lisa played some Christmas songs today as members arrived and when they were settled with their teas/coffees and cakes,
Lisa welcomed everyone and provided some updates. Lisa also had some short story jokes today and read one of them which got everyone laughing. We had different music entertainment today. Lisa invited Rachelle Goldberg who brought her electric violin. It was certainly unusual from a normal looking violin. Rachelle played it beautifully and played some very well-known songs that members were familiar with and able to sing along.
Thank you Rachelle for coming to the Finchley Memorial Hospital dementia club. It was lovely that Rachelle stayed for the rest of the session and members were delighted.
The session followed with Bingo which is a popular game which members enjoy playing especially as Lisa has prizes to give out. The Full House was won by Joan today and she received a lovely prize – a Santa cosmetic zip bag which Joan was very pleased.
Everyone had a lovely afternoon. Mark was missed but thank you to the volunteers Dr Angela, Angela Chen and Melissa.
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We are delighted that Boots Brent Cross Pre-Registration Pharmacists had chosen Dementia Club UK as their dementia awareness project. Boots Brent Cross store manager Kunjal Sutaria was always very supportive in previous years when our charity had dementia awareness days in the Centre part of Brent Cross.
Lisa and Mark brought the OM interactive game system which we set up at 10.00am at the entrance of the Boots Brent Cross shop. We were then met by 5 Boots pre-registration pharmacists who were there to help on the day.
As the day got busier we had quite a few people showing interest in the OM interactive game system especially the children. A few people also took some details about the charity and wanted some advice which Lisa was able to provide. Lisa stayed there for 2 hours and then had to leave as she had to go and set up the dementia club at the Finchley Memorial Hospital.
It was a very successful day and some money was also raised through collection. Thank you to all of the pre-registration pharmacists who made the day successful;
- Henal Ramgi from Boots Brent Cross
- Mira Chotai from Boots Edmonton Green
- Soma Sadood from Boots Camden
- Jona Mulla from Boots Kentish Town
- Abdi Omar from Boots Enfield Town
Also thank you to Uday Mistry – Deputy Manager of Boots Brent Cross.
Dementia Club UK would like to wish all the pre-registration pharmacists the best of luck for their future.
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