New Year's Eve Games

Here are a few game ideas for New Year's Eve that after looking on-line, I feel will work for the seniors in my retirement community.  They are pretty easy to get done at the last minute...... pick one, shake up the normal routine for the evening and make your party special!


I Resolve …Write as many New Year resolutions as you can think of on slips of paper. Make them as serious and silly as you like. Fold them and put them in a basket. Ask your guests to take one. If they don't think the resolution is for them, they have to try to give it away to someone else. Have them read their resolution out to the others beginning with "I resolve…" Some New Year game suggestions are:
• Save money. • Eat more chocolate. • Lose weight.
• Exercise less. • Spend more time with friends.
• Spend more money on a loved one. • Play more with your children. • Quit smoking. • Quit drinking. • Read more.
• Talk less. • Make more money. • Give more money to charity.
• Eat honey instead of sugar. • Get a new career.
• Find a new love. • Adopt a dog. • Give up caffeine.
• Learn a new hobby. • Roller skate to work.
• Resolve any problems of the heart. • Go to Church more often.
• Do more volunteer work. • Go on holidays to somewhere romantic. • Surf the net more. • Surf the net less. • Renew old acquaintances.
• Ride a bike. • Stop making resolutions.
　
Month Guessing  Game - Go through old magazines from the past year, look on kine and print itmes of interest, or to your local library to search through old news articles. Find the events that took place in the past year. Make a list of these events, and ask your guests to guess which month the event took place in. Whoever guesses the most right wins a prize.

This next game is a great spectator sport for New Year's Eve. Set up several groups of two people. These people will compete with each other. Two partners stand face-to-face, arms extended, palms touching. Either blindfold each person or have them close their eyes. Have them turn around five times and try to find their partners palms again and return to their original positions without looking.

And the last game idea is to ask each of your guests write down 5 resolutions, each on its own slip of paper. Pull one slip of paper out of a basket at a time and read it out loud. Everyone has to write down who they think made each resolution. At the end of the readings, the person who guessed the most correctly wins a prize. Read some of the wrong guesses out loud for fun!

ps.I'd give credit to the sites that I took these from, but they were listed on multiple sites, so I thought that it was fair game to post here for you.

Poker Walk

Fitness is a big part of any activities calendar in a retirement community. Fitness programs can, and should, appear with many different titles and be held in many different locations, but the main element is that residents get moving!

One of the activities that we have done on an annual basis for the past eight years is called a Poker Walk. It was derived from an annual motorcycle fund raiser event that takes place in our area's greater community. It is a program that is simple to put together and fun for the residents.

First, plan your route for your walkers. Ours is just about a mile long and circles our campus. Then plan where your five stations will be and place a table and chair or two at each location, along with a deck of playing cards and a cooler with small individual bottles of water in in. Large print cards work better if you have them, but it is not necessary.

You will need to create a grid that has a five rows (one for each station) and four columns, one for each type of suite in the deck of cards. (hearts, clubs, spades, and diamonds) Make sure there is a place for the resident's name at the top. You will get two grids on an 8.5 x 11 piece of paper.

The day of your event, you would have a reception table with the grid available for each participant. They "register" by taking the paper and writing their name on the top of it, and then taking it along with them on the walk. We decorate the tables with balloons and/or a card theme. (If you need to have them sign up ahead of time to know how many will attend, do so, but their will be extras joining you when they see what is happening.)

Residents walking are reminded before they leave that this is not a race and are encouraged to enjoy the walk, the sights along the way and the fellowship of their friends and neighbors. When a resident gets to a table, they draw a card and the number (2-10) or letter (J, Q, K or A) is written under the appropriate column. They will repeat this at each table. I will say that it is easier to spread the cards out on the table (if there is not breeze) and let more than one person pick a card at the same time. This helps keep the residents moving and not standing in line for their turn at the table. This is where a second person helps so they can write the results down as the first person manages the card draws. When then get finished with the route, they bring their paper back to the registration table to get reviewed. The best poker hand wins. 

We have a nurse going around on a golf cart to make sure that everyone is alright. If someone is not able to walk the whole thing, she picks them up and takes them to the rest of the tables on the route. Some residents have even gone from the first table to the last table and just drawn all their cards at the last table. We really encourage this to be a walking event, but we do not turn away someone in a scooter or other kind of aid.

Refreshments should be available once the group finishes. Also, in order to allow time to tally the results, you might consider a health fair or some other casual interactive program where the residents can visit at different times (since not everyone will be there at the same time).

p.s. Check out my other articles regarding fitness for seniors by going to the link at the top left labeled Fitness.

Keep 'Em Going!

Holiday Decorations

Have you eaten your Wheaties? Are you ready for the holiday season? I've been out shopping and getting ready to decorate our community for Christmas and Hanukkah. I will have the day off after Thanksgiving, so I will start on Monday.

I was wondering if you, as the activities director of your community, are the responsible person for the decorations. Do you have volunteers, staff members, residents, or an outside company help you?  In my retirement community, the maintenance department does all of our outside lights and they help me get the artificial trees up. This year we will be buying a live tree for our lobby, since it is newly renovated and we thought that it would be a nice change.

I do have managers that like to help also, so they help me decorate the trees. We have a tree in the lobby, as I mentioned, plus one in our casual dining area, one in the auditorium, and one in the main dining room. We also have a card tree where residents tie on their greeting card for the community to see. It makes a pretty tree. I simply put the tree out with lights on it, and then place a hole puncher and sleigh full of pre-cut red ribbons for them to use next to the tree.

Then, of course there are the decorations that jazz up the lobby and auditorium. Those are the special items that I think really make the community feel special and ties the trees into the room. The special Santa that they see each year, the nutcrackers, etc. etc. that set the scene for the room. I enjoy decorating the community more than I do my home these days. Or maybe it is that by the time I've finished at work, I don't have much energy left for home. I'm not sure, but I do know that this is the busiest and greats time of the year.

I hope that you enjoy your Thanksgiving holiday and that you will enjoy the crazy-ness of the next few weeks as activities director! Take a deep breath and GO GET IT DONE!

Simple Social Suggestion

Ralph Waldo Emerson said "It is not length of life,
but depth of life."

As activities directors for independent living senior adults, this is a quote that I feel could be painted on our office walls! It reminds us of the importance of having a meaningful program for our residents. It would also serve the residents well to see this quote to remind them to live each day to its fullest and with meaning!

I have shared some ideas with you on this blog that are fun, but this time, I want to speak about something that may or may not be considered an "activity" that you can list on your calendar. It may even fall under the culinary department in your community, instead of the activities department, but I'm still going to share it with you because I've seen the success of it at my community. It is simply a time and a place in your community where coffee is available to residents and their guests to have for free. And yes, you as the activities director can and should suggest it!

I can hear some of you already saying this has nothing to do with me, but please take a minute to finish reading this. I promise it won't be long. Part of our job involves the resident's social happiness... and this does meet that need. I can also hear you say that with the budget cuts, that this is out of the question. There is no harm in asking though, is there? And then there are a few of you who think that residents will abuse this free service or that your culinary department will not be able to manage it well. And yes, there will be days when those will be correct thoughts. But overall, it does work. Oh, and the marketing department loves this idea! Now there are people in the lobby when prospective residents come to see our community..... and they can offer them a cup of coffee too.

My community set up a coffee area outside our administration office that serves coffee from 10:00 a.m until 2:00 p.m. Monday through Saturday. (Sunday we serve breakfast and then dinner at noon so they have plenty of opportunities for coffee in the same time frame as the other days.) We've made sure there are plenty of seats for those interested in staying for a chat, and the area is usually very busy. Residents are encouraged to bring their own mugs if they want to, but it is not necessary.  Refills are requested when coffee runs low and the culinary department brings it ASAP. Sometimes this is quickly and sometimes there is a wait, but like I said, there are usually people to talk to, so the wait is not that bad.

We have residents who started bring cookies, donughts, etc. to add to the coffee area. We make sure to make a sign that gives credit to the resident for their donation. It makes them feel good for the recognition and others are able to thank them. It also lets the residents know that this is not from our kitchen, in case it is not good, etc.  We haven't had that as an issue before, but just in case. It has even got some residents started on a baking routine that is just amazing! 

I've made this longer than I thought it would be - I'm sorry, but I got excited. Take a look at your community. Where would be a good place for you to initiate this? It might be in your library, like a Barnes and Nobles. Maybe it's in your foyer like the hotels do, or in your dining room that is only used in the evenings? Remember, this is the resident's home and you will be able to find the place that will work for them to sit with their friends, the ones they know and the ones they've yet to meet and enjoy a cup of coffee or tea. It truly is simple and yet adds another level to the depth of the days the resident will spend in their community.

Activity Sign-up Sheets

So you have created a terrific program idea for your independent living retirement community residents. You have advertised it well, and people are interested. How do you assure that those who want to attend go on the program and, if there is a charge for it, charge them?

At my retirement community, I have a space in the main lobby (also know as the club house by our marketing people), where I have a bulletin board and a place for sign up sheets. On the bulletin board are the posters for the on-going events and special programs that are taking place. On-going activities are to shopping trips, doctors offices, and religious services. I have them broken down into different binders: one for shopping (groceries and malls), one for doctors, sectioned in its own book by the direction the bus will travel (north, south, east or west). Each direction goes on specific days of the week and they are noted on the main calendar. And the last book for on-going activities is for religious services. This book is broken down by the day the bus  goes, Sundays or Fridays. For the most part, these on-going activities run smoothly as far as those who sign up, go, and those who don't sign up can usually add onto the bus without much concern. There are no fees for these kinds of buses in my community, so that is not an issue for me either.

The programs that I really wanted to address are those special outings that have a fee associated with them. I keep these sign-up sheets in a book that I call "In-House Programs and Activities Book." If you are like me, I have a few problems that have been issues forever. The first is that if I purchase tickets for a program, I make a sign- up sheet with that many spots on it. After those spaces are made, I stop numbering the lines and put the words WAIT LIST BEGINS BELOW. This didn't seem to work because the residents did not see those words and just assumed that if they added their name onto the page for the activity, that they were "good to go."  So, I started highlight the words in a different color on the sign up sheet. Still not much better.  Now, I started highlighting the entire section of the wait list. I've been saying now that if your name is in the colored section that you are on the wait list.

The wait list. What exactly does that mean to you and to your residents? That is problem number two. To me, being on a wait list means that the resident on that list is waiting to get a call from me to say that there is now space or ticket to go on the outing. I think that is pretty straight forward, but some folks don't understand that. That information is in their "Resident Guide to Services" book that they get when they first move in and is repeated on occasion in evening announcements that go out to the community on a bi-weekly basis.

The other problem that I have with sign-up sheets is that if a person on the list crosses their name off, that another person may come to the sign-up sheet and add their name to the list without consideration for the people's name on the wait list. Seems like they would be considerate, but people are people. I've been trying to pull the lists into my office when they are full and a wait list has started, but that does not always work. Then if a resident does not see the sign-up sheet, they have to either stop in or call me to have me add them to or cancel them from the list.

Another problem, though minor, that takes place in my retirement community is that sometimes people are mean and cross someones name off the list. It hasn't happened that often, but it has really happened. Sad. Not sure how to get around that, except to try and get that resident back on the list as quickly as possible.

And lastly, once the activity is going to go, I try to be in the lobby as the bus is loading to check off the people's names. This is not always possible, so what I've been doing lately is asking a resident volunteer to do it for me. Usually this would be a person on the list, but not always. If there are tickets involved, the volunteer will hand those out for me also. The problem occurs when a person who signed up, doesn't show up - especially if there is a wait list! It is so frustrating. Our policy is that if the resident doesn't show, and there is a cost that has been paid (not our own bus fee), that the resident will be charged for it. That makes it a little easier financially for the activities department budget, but that does not help the resident on the wait list who wanted to go. This is a problem that continues to annoy me.

Having a good procedure for signing up and charging the correct attendees for an outing is very important to the success of your department and to mine. I would love to see your thoughts on this subject. As you can see this is one area that I've been working on and still would like to get better!

Veterans Day Service

In our retirement community, Veterans Day is a very special event. This holiday honors the living veterans who served and are serving our great country. In our independent living community, we have Veterans from WWII, the Koren War and Vietnam War. Veterans Day is always celebrated on November 11 at 11:00 a.m.  (I think really it is suppose to be 11:11 am, but that might look funny on your calendar.)

Our program usually involves a few key elements. The first is that we ask the men in the community to make sure that we have the service stats so that we can announce their branch and length of service. This information may be printed on the day's program, used as part of a slide show or shared by the speaker leading the program.  We like to give our veterans a chance to stand out on this day. We ask them to gather together and proceed into the auditorium to sit in a reserved section for them. Sometimes I order a boutonniere or corsage for them to wear into the service, or give them a flag pin, bumper sticker, or other small special gift.

The program begins with the pledge of allegiance and is followed by prayers, songs and speakers. My community's chaplain is the principal participant in this holiday event. I have assisted him with decorations, creating the program, hiring a guest speaker, get a color guard from the area's high school, and making a special slide show that shows the resident in an active duty photo, followed by a current day photo. I was lucky with this and had a resident help getting the old pictures scanned and taking the new ones. Maybe you have that type of volunteer in your community. We also include the playing of each of the branches specific song and ask each person in the audience to stand when they hear a song that is special to them. This is very touching and moves me to tears each time as I look around and see the pride in the audience.  Remember in order to get a speaker or color guard, you will need to plan ahead. This date and time are the same for everyone, and they may be booked already if you wait to long.

In an effort to keep the Veterans Day service fresh every year, we rotate the use of a segment of our program. It is really designed for Memorial Day, but we include it every other year in our Veterans service. It is the White Table Service. Basically:

The table is round — to show our everlasting concern for our missing men.
The tablecloth is white — symbolizing the purity of their motives when answering the call to duty.
The single red rose, displayed in a vase, reminds us of the life of each of the missing, and the loved ones and friends of these Americans who keep the faith, awaiting answers.
The vase is tied with a ribbon, symbol of our continued determination to account for our missing.
A slice of lemon on the bread plate is to remind us of the bitter fate of those captured and missing in a foreign land.
A pinch of salt symbolizes the tears endured by those missing and their families who seek answers.
The Bible represents the strength gained through faith to sustain those lost from our country, founded as one nation under God.
The glass is inverted — to symbolize their inability to share this evening’s [morning''s/day''s] toast.
The chairs are empty — they are missing.
A Candle– Lit to remember that the light of America will always be the light in a world of darkness.



I found a great place for getting a free information, including a Veterans Day poster each year on the internet. There is also a place where you can learn about films that honor the fallen. You may want to use this in the evening following your service, or save it for Memorial Day. And lastly, I found a place that shows videos that celebrates Veterans:http://www.military.com/video/specialties-and-personnel/veterans/militarycom-celebrate-our-veterans/666271426001/  You might be able to save it onto your computer and use it in your service.

This is one of those days that I truly believe is a "must do, and must do right" program that you should have in your retirement community every year. It means so much to so many in your community.

Halloween

It's almost that time of year when you can get dressed up in a costume at work. Oh, wait, you are an activities director in a retirement community..... you do that on a regular basis. If you are like me, you have a "costume closet" somewhere at work or in your house so that you are ready for any theme party that comes your way. It is one of the fun parts about being an activities director.

If you are like me, what you want to wear and what is okay to wear to work are usually different. Halloween is no exception! In my community, residents pay close attention to my wardrobe and the last thing I want to do is offend anyone. Because of that, I do tend to dress a bit conservatively. For Halloween, I don't wear, or display, anything that is related to death or anything that is evil.

I've taken time, so that you don't have to, and found costumes that I feel I could wear (some with modifications -  like adding tights, etc) to work. I've eliminated anything that was to scary, gross, skimpy, childish, or that we, as activities professionals, get to wear from time to time in our jobs. There are some here for men, women and those that would work for either sex. Put your mouse over the pictures for details and click to go to the item's page. If you don't see anything below, click here to see them all. Most have free shipping and returns.

Now is the time to order so that you can assure that you have your costume for Monday, October 31st! Happy Halloween!

Fancy China Party

Break out the good china! At my retirement community there are homes that are beautifully decorated by residents who have a great deal of class and style. As a home owner, I know the pride a person feels about their home and the items in it, and as the activities director, I try to find ways for residents to share their interests with the community.

I've had a few different programs that offer this experience. One of my favorites to host is a Fancy China Party. You can call it by another name, but here is what it is all about. I put out an invitation to the community inviting the residents to attend a tea party style lunch in our private dining room. I asked the residents to bring a set of their fancy china to set on the table in advance. Each person is given time in advance to set their place at the table. The culinary department completes the tables with the standard items that each table will need.

At the lunch, each person takes time to explain the history of their place setting. The stories were very interesting to all of us.

You will need to work out the details about the clean-up of the dishes prior to your event. We felt like we could clean the dishes and then send them home with the residents and luckily nothing was broken in the process. Make sure you speak with each resident about what they'd like you to do with their items and also with the staff in the kitchen.

This would be a great event for Mother's Day, so make a note on your calendars now and consider yourself one step ahead for May 2012!

Check out the items that will help enhance your tea party luncheon.

Gift Cards as Prizes

What do you get for residents living in independent living retirement communities as a prize when they have everything that they need already? Gift cards! How many times have you heard that the residents are trying to get rid of stuff in their homes at this stage in their lives? I hear it a lot, and I hate to wast money on silly stuff, so I find that gift cards have been a great prize to award when I need a prize. Yes, I could give (and do sometimes) food items, but that is tricky with special diets.

I like to give away a few different kinds of gift cards. The first is more like a gift certificate instead of a card. This is a personalized certificate that I make in my office and can be applied towards the price of a fee for service activity in our community. I've made them for my activities department as well as the housekeeping and culinary departments. They are redeemable with the department heads of the various departments.

The other type of gift card is the store bought variety. Most of the residents like getting ones for the grocery stores or the drug stores. I also buy Walmart, Target and other department stores. I make sure that wherever I get a card from, that our community provides transportation to the store at some point in the near future. Visa or Mastercards are alright also, but there are usually extra fees attached to them when you buy them.

There was an article in my local paper today regarding gift card resellers on the Internet. Be very careful about selecting a reputable site to shop from if you choose to buy gift cards on-line. Here are a few that are mentioned in the newspaper article that seem good, though I have not had any transactions with them yet.

* plasticjungle.com

* giftcards.com

Remember that Amazon has all kinds of gift cards. I tried to select a few that would be most likely in your area to show you on this blog, but since there are readers from all over, you will want to check out the link above to see what more is being offered. The easy of ordering on-line through Amazon, free shipping on most items and knowing how safe it is, makes perfect sense to me! No more driving to different stores makes for a happy Activities Director and happy residents

Webcam 101 for Seniors....

Teacher's Luncheon

Hosting a Teacher's appreciation luncheon for retired educators in your retirement community at the beginning of the school year is a great activity to offer which brings together residents with similar backgrounds. I host this particular luncheon every couple of years, and it is always a success. I invite the retired educators from my community to bring along a memento from their days at work and share it with the group. I hold this lunch in our private dining room because it fits about 40 people nicely, and due to time constraints, I find this is as big of a groups as I’d like to have.

I used apples as my theme for the afternoon. For decorations, I use a few paper products that can be found at most party supply stores and then made my own center pieces. For the center pieces, I kept it simple. I used glass vases and added an assortment of apples, a wooden ruler and some pencils to it. I also made name tags with a themed border around the edge for all those who attended. The menu had an apple theme to it also. It included a Waldorf salad and apple pie for dessert.

The residents did bring mementos and had a lot to share! I learned that teachers are very comfortable being at the head of the class.... and I found it necessary to stop a few people from going on too long. Their stories were amazing. I learned that one man, who never speaks much in the community, was an educator in the same county that I grew up in! We spoke for a while afterwards and I know that it made us both feel more connected to each other. 


Some other ideas that I might try next time are to invite the residents to participate in the following:

• Naming state capitals and/or presidents,

• Ask them to add fractions or answer geography questions.

• Have an Art Class where each person gets a piece of paper and crayon and then turn out the light. Instruct them all to draw the same thing. When the lights come on see how well they did. 

• Have a quick Spelling Bee by picking a few words to spell that might be hard for them or easy words that must be spelled backwards in a very short time. 

• Have the residents match Definitions of odd words.

• Gum is not allowed in class, but maybe you can have a Bubble Blowing Contest.

Prizes can include pencils or stickers. See the Activities Director's Store for more ideas!

This was a great opportunity for the residents in my CCRC to get to know one another and I'm sure that it would be good for yours also. This, of course, can be done for other professions.... you just need to understand who lives in your community first to be successful. Maybe you can learn that information from your sales staff if you don't know. Give this kind of program a try and I'm sure that you will go to the head of the class with your residents!

 

Cancer Walk with Residents

Last year a few employees from the communities that I work with decided to walk in the local breast cancer walk. It was a terrific experience and though I walked in walks before, I found myself feeling closer to the women I've worked with because of the time we spent on the walk away from work, getting to know one another, and the reason why we walked! I realized that this was a community event that some of the residents in our CCRC communities would like to be involved with also. I encouraged our Fitness Director to take the lead in this year's event and she did. We are now a team and will be walking again this year with employees and residents. We will even have the company bus for our group to arrive in style! I am really looking forward to this year's event!

Here is the link for our team. We are the ACTS Pacesetters. If you are interested in joining us great! If you can donate to the team, wonderful. If this gives you an idea to get your residents involved in a community event like this, terrific! And THANKS!!

Here is a follow up article with more ideas of what you can do in your community with your residents to encourage awareness and fund raise for breast cancer in October..

Brain Fitness Training for Seniors

Here is an interesting article about a study that was done at UCLA about brain fitness training for seniors. It is very interesting. The program ran for 6 weeks (2x/wk)  and included one-hour education sessions included content on how memory works; quick strategies for remembering names, faces and numbers; and training on basic memory tools such as linking ideas and creating visual images. They found that it helped improve the resident's ability to recognize and recall words, benefiting their verbal learning and retention.  Check it out at the link above and then see if you can work in any programs that could provide such an opportunity for your residents! I also found a memory fitness book that might be helpful. Also, please check out my store's memory enhancement section for more items that would be beneficial to the resident's mind.

Tablet using Seniors

Check out this article about seniors using iPads and other tablets.

Also take a look at an early posting about the subject on my blog called iPads and Seniors

And, if you are not sure what a tablet is, where to look to find one to buy, etc, click here for a link for iPads.

Gold Prices Entice Seniors

Cha cha ching! Can you hear the sound of cash in your resident's pockets? At my "sister-community" they held a Gold Rush Party, and residents brought their unwanted gold in and walked away with money. They will be hosting another party in October and those interested from my community will attend. The portion of revenue that goes to the community has been earmarked for a tree project that will impact both communities. Read all about it in the Sun Sentinel newspaper article "High gold prices tempt selling."

Update: we have had the event with a local gold buying company http://www.atlanticgoldnow.com/Home.html at our community twice now. It is worth doing in your community as a fund raiser. Find the right person to come to your community and it will feel good to the residents who are interested in selling their gold and silver. 

Movie Scheduling

　

In my original article about showing movies in your retirement community, I spoke about the basics of planning your movie schedule and offered movie suggestions to show in your retirement community. In this article, I will address the rest of the movie story.

As the activities director my goal is to get the residents OUT of their apartment! I don't remember who it was that talked me into showing the movies in their apartments to start with.... but I wish that I never started it. It has been years now since Fridays have been movie nights and residents have the choice of watching from their home or from their apartment. But, after Labor Day, that is about to change! Yeah!!

I started a Monday Movie Matinee feature on my calendar during the summer months last year. This year, it really caught on in the community and they were well attended. I offered free popcorn and punch to those who came to the show. I also showed movies that I felt were the "cream of the crop" for the season.

At my last activities committee meeting, we discussed the movies and my feelings about trying to get residents out of their homes instead of giving them a reason to stay at home.... and the committee agreed. They really liked the idea of having popcorn and punch at the shows, and realized that it was not as inciting after dinner on a Friday night as it would be in the middle of the afternoon.... so it was decided that we would go to Monday matinees. I also had a request to use the closed caption feature on the shows. I think that I will try that and see what the opinion is after a few weeks.

I would love to see the idea of having the movies during the day work out instead of having them in the evening! It will help me also when I can assure that the movie gets started and stopped at the correct time. (I had to rely on our security guard to do it in the past, but now it will be up to me... and I have a new secret weapon that I have to learn how to use.... it is part of the new TouchTown system that I got. The movie can be scheduled into the in-house TV system to run at the right time.)

I found a good and legal website to watch classic movies and documentaries on your computer, IPad, Iphone or Android device. Check out Fullmovies.com This would be great to have on a community Ipad that you can take from room to room for those needing that service

Coney Island Theme Party

As we say goodbye to summer we will be having a Coney Island Theme Party in my retirement community. My thoughts about this have been buzzing around for a few months now, but in the end I've decided to go with the KISS method. Keep It Simple Stupid, or Silly as I like to say, since I don't think simplicity is stupid or anyone who chooses to do things simply is stupid.

That being said, let me share with you what I'll be doing in the community for our Coney Island night. First, of course is that I went on-line to see what the place is all about since I've never been there. I did find a few websites that were helpful. I believe that what the residents would remember about Coney Island and what it is now are different. So I read about the history of the theme park also. From the websites, I was able to "grab" a few pictures that I will enlarge and post around at the event.

In my community, we have booths that are three sided that our maintenance department made for the activities department long ago. Some people call them store fronts also I think. I will have about a half-dozen of these placed around the lobby of our community. We will have 3 food booths and 3 game booths. These booths will be decorated to look like carnival station areas. (Check back next week for pictures.)

The menu will be a salad bar, fresh pop corn, Nathan's Hot dogs, sausage and peppers, and baked beans, corn on the cob, french fries, and more goodies that I can not recall right now. For dessert there will be root beer floats, snow cones, ice cream cones and novelty sandwiches. (Funny how I can remember all of those!)

In the game booths we will have a bean bag toss, spinning wheel, and either a dart/balloon game or knocking over bowling pins game. Residents who play can earn raffle tickets based upon their performance. A drawing will be held after dinner at the show in the auditorium.

Decorations for the party will include balloons, pendant banners, the pictures of Coney  Island and some beach items. I'm also making costume banners (with PrintShop) that I will use for identifying what is in each booth. Oh, and I can not forget, I will bring down the "turn stile" that I had made a few year's ago, that I will put out. I usually label it an "exit" with signs pointing to the "parking areas." I also found some wonderful items on Amazon for Coney Island.

Residents will be served their dinner from the booths and then will take them into the dining room where it is "open seating." The servers will serve any resident who can not handle the booths in the lobby. They will be served the same items as if they went to the booth.

After dinner prizes will be award for those who played the games and we will have a great show. It will be a fun night. You might even show one of the DVDs or VHS that I found on-line after dinner. I hope you'll check back and see the pictures and hear what worked and what didn't. If you have any experiences that you want to share about a fair type of theme party, please do so.

ps. Take a look at my other theme ideas listed in the category listed on the left or start at Thinking About Themes.

New Year's Eve Again!?!

This week, I started making the final plans for my New Year's Eve party for the independent living residents in my CCRC (Continuing Care Retirement Community). The residents like to have a dance, so that is what I do each year. The trick is to make it a bit different each year.

Depending on the residents in the community, sometimes our dance is right after dinner, from 7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. and sometimes it is 9:30 p.m. until 12:30 p.m. Check out one of my first blog postings ever when I talked about New Year's Eve last year.

This week I spoke with a talent agent that I use from time to time to arrange my musical entertainment. I like to use an agent for New Year's Eve because I want to be assured that I will have someone there that night. It has happened before that I book a performer and he or she finds a better paying job and comes up with an excuse to cancel our arrangement (even with a contract in hand!).  I know that with the agent that I pay a bit more, but the piece of mind is worth it to me.

The agent sent a contract to me that said "one man band" for New Year's Eve. I called to ask what the person's name was and when I was told, I went to my list of performers and found that I did not want him. (Please see my posting on this important tool for scheduling entertainers.) After that conversation, the agent called me to say that they wanted to check a man's name to see if he was on my approved list before they called him to see if he was available. I thought that was great.

My next step is to finalize my dance hosts. With all the single ladies in the community, it is hard to imagine a dance without them! Check out my blog and the articles there about dance hosts in retirement communities! After that, I will be getting my New Year's Eve Party supplies.

Don't wait to the last minute to make a plan for this special night. Your residents will thank you for it!

Dog show and Technology

It is August and in my retirement community, that means a dog show. (See the article on Dog Days of Summer on this blog for the details.) I was trying to figure out how I could involve the audience that will be at the dog show in the voting process, when it dawned on me... technology!

One of the cool things about the company that I work for is that I have other communities, a regional office, and a corporate office to get resources from for my programs. I saw that our corporate culinary department purchased a voting system. It is called Turning Point System. The system provides each resident with a hand held device that responds to a laptop that is loaded with the proper software.

For the dog show, I will give each audience member a list of possible awards to be given out at the end of the show. (I will have more titles to win then there will be dogs in the show so that the dogs have a chance of fitting into an appropriate category.)  Using the system, the residents in the audience will vote for each category and prizes will be given out!

I'm very excited about adding this new twist to a community favorite! I'll let you know how it goes after the program! (Pictures too)

Men's Connection with Activities

Yes, males are the minority in my retirement community and they probably are in yours too. Let's face it, as Activity Directors, they are a segment of the population that is easy to ignore when planning your monthly calendar each month. I find that the men who are part of a couple, usually are active with their spouse but I don't see them really get involved independently. And then the men who are single, be them widowers, forever bachelors, straight or guy, seldom want to participate in an activity that is marketed to men only.

I feel like there are men in my community that I really never have gotten to know very well because they are not involved in activities. This article says that men are happy when they go to programs that are cultural in nature, if they feel there is a health benefit for themselves and when they can volunteer to help others.  I don't know about you, but I do not see the men in our community signing up to go to the museum, or other programs that I thing are "cultural," very often.

I have tried men's only lunch trips to sports bars and even to Hooters! No takers. I've tried hosting a men's dinner at the community, where they could come and have an alcoholic beverage (which is something special in my community)..... and that was a flop also. Next we are going to try going to the theater for something that we know most women will not be interested in.... and sell it to the men. We will see what happens!

I know that the idea is to offer something for everyone and let the residents select what they want to do. I just continue to struggle with programming for men! Any ideas for programs for men living in the INDEPENDENT LIVING side of a continuing care community would be greatly appreciated.

Game Night

Every so often I put on my calendar a program that I simply call Game Night. I advertise it as a night that the residents can come to the auditorium and play whatever game they want to. It is a place where they can find people who might be interested in learning their favorite game, so that in the future they can get together and play.

I ask the residents to sign up for the evening and list what game(s) they are interested in playing. This helps me because I know how many tables to set up and also which games I need to bring to the event. I invite the residents to bring their game and supplies also. I also made name tags for everyone on my list, and had blanks for those "last minute Marys" that like to show up.

I had about 30 people sign up and about 30 people attend..... but not the same people that signed up showed up.... but that is typical in my community. I provide a 6ft table full of games - some that the community owns and some that I personally own.  The games included Life, Clue, Monopoly, Rummikub, Backgammon, Chess, Checkers, Cards, Phase 10 Twist, Dominoes, Yahtzee, Othello, Scrabble and others. 

  

The residents played bridge, Rummikub, Mexican Train Dominoes, Backgammon and a card game called PIT. What was fun was to see the residents who were prepared to learn something new, I had a table that was teaching Rummikub, one that was teaching the Mexican Train Dominoes game and another that was teaching the PIT game.  I also had a lady that took the Phase 10 Twist game home so that she could learn it. She has since come to me and told me that she is going to have a few game playing ladies over to her apartment and they are going to learn it together!

I had a resident who really wanted to play Backgammon and there was no one else interested, so I volunteered to play with him. I thought that I knew how to play the game, but it has been awhile since I played, and if I recall, was beaten by my teenage son!  Thankfully the resident was willing to teach me as we went along and as we played, I learned that he was a tournament Backgammon player! YIKES! All I can say was that if I embarrassed myself by the way I played, I was to dumb about it to even realize it! Guess that is one of the best part about the job.... being the young one in the room most of the time with lots of good senior knowledge to share with the youngster!

It was an easy night to put together and the response was very positive. I might do it more often, and I don't think that I need to be there to make it work! That is even better.

In-House TV Channel

At my retirement community we went from having a daily flip-chart pad in the lobby to an in-house TV channel about 14 years ago. We have updated twice and we are getting ready to update it again in the next month.
Currently we use a system called DSI. It works very well for our community and I would encourage you to look into it as an option if you are looking for a system.  Click on the link to go to Display System Internationals website.
On the current channel, we run pages that show the daily activities, the menu in our casual dining area for breakfast, lunch and dinner, special activities, reoccurring activities such as monthly lectures or services, etc. We also live broadcast of our Town Hall and Ask the Director meetings when they take place.

I have two wonderful volunteers who work on this project with me. One lady only wants to add the calendar to the system. That means that she types a page per square of the calendar onto the system. Most of the time, as you can imagine, that means editing the existing information to make it current. The other volunteer is more creative. She enjoys going onto the Internet and finding graphics that will enhance the special pages. Her husband enjoys photography, so that is a plus. He takes pictures of items in the community that she uses and it personalizes the channel even more!

I am very fortunate to have these two volunteers because it does not leave me a lot to do with the program. I have learned how to take the posters that I use in the community to sell my programs and use them on the system. That helps alot.

Our biggest problem is getting people to tune in! We have music that some residents say they tune into just to listen to, and I hope they see what's on their TV.... but who knows. I know that people tune in for the soup specials also... but I really want them to use it as a source for their questions when it comes to activities, etc. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

In the next month, the volunteers and I will begin training on our new system. I am very excited about the new system for a few reasons. The first is that any trained person can access the system from their own personal computer. This is different from the old system, which you had to go onto the special computer located in my office. The next reason I am looking forward to the new product it because, it will allow me to type my calendar once and it will add it to the software that produces the daily pages. And the final reason that I think this will be great is that it will start and stop a scheduled video on its own! That for me is huge! I am the responsible one during the day that does this job or the one that has to make sure someone else does the job when I am busy or away. This new company is called TouchTown and I encourage you to check into their website also!

Photo Source: TouchTown

I would love to hear if you use an -in-house system in your retirement community and what your experiences are. Are you the one responsible for it? Do other staff members work on it or just send you what they want shown? Do volunteers work on the system?  I'll let you know how my new venture with TouchTown goes...... stay tuned.