Activities at Beeston View Memory Lane Community

This week we have been celebrating Carers Week and our Residents were very keen to acknowledge the wonderful care our dedicated and hard-working Carers give to them.

They worked hard making and decorating delicious cakes and individual rose posies and were thrilled to be able to present them to each Carer as a thank-you for all they do.

All the teams also received homemade cakes and boxes full of treats from chocolates, sweets, biscuits and all the naughty things in life!

The residents also made hand drawn thank you cards and arranged flower posies. Again a massive thank you to all our fabulous care team for all they do, each and every day for our residents.

We were lucky enough to be an official stop on Day 3 of the Tour de Barchester cycle challenge and Residents and Staff were delighted to welcome the cycling team to a much-needed pit-stop at our home.

The riders were thrilled to receive a motorcycle escort down our driveway ridden by our Head Chef, John assisted by his pillion passenger, Tracy our Admin Assistant. They were welcomed by flag-waving, cheering Residents and Staff and celebrated on our winner’s podium which had been made by our Maintenance Manager, John.

The cycling team then enjoyed a delicious lunch provided by the homes talented hospitality team and a beautiful carrot cake and Tour de Barchester branded cookies made by our General Manager, Kirsty. The aim of this challenge was to raise money for the many charities the Barchester Foundation support and our home are proud to have raised £200 by riding the equivalent 250 miles of the tour on an exercise bike!

This was truly a team effort where our Residents and all of the departments at our home have been involved and an event which everyone enjoyed and has made us proud!

We celebrated 10 years of service to Sarah Pearce!

Well done Sarah on such a huge milestone! Sarah previously worked within the care team, but has since moved to the hospitality team.

John, Head Chef presented Sarah with her award, gold pin and flowers.

Thank you for your dedication to your residents and colleagues Sarah and a massive thank you.

Enjoy! Love Kirsty and the whole team x

This week our Residents were delighted to welcome two new and unusual woolly friends into their home.

Teddy and Carlos are two large but extremely well-behaved alpacas who came all the way from Knightley Alpaca Trekking in Stafford with their humans to spend an afternoon with us. And our Residents (and staff!) just loved them!

Teddy and Carlos visited all three of our communities at Iddenshall Hall & Beeston View, even meeting some of our Residents in their own rooms. They are such intuitive animals who seemed to sense when they needed to be especially calm and gentle. Their visit was so successful and fun and we cannot wait to welcome them back soon!

With the wonderful weather we're having, we celebrated World Cocktail Day in our gardens!

We started preparing the cocktails, adding fresh fruit like oranges and strawberries. In the other, we added cucumber and mint, we also used lemonade and ice, plus grenadine & Pimms.

The residents joined in, and everyone was happy, enjoying the flavour of their drinks and a pleasant conversation. It was a lovely afternoon and we've all now found the taste for what we'd like next time the sun is out!

February 6th was New Zealand's National Day, which is also known as Waitangi Day. On this day in 1840, the Treaty of Waitangi was signed between many, but not all, the Maori tribes and the British Crown, and it has since become a national holiday in New Zealand.

To celebrate this day, the residents enjoyed tasting kiwi fruit and also learnt the Haka, a traditional Maori dance.

We had a fantastic time painting our faces with traditional Maori designs, striking Haka poses and watching the All Blacks rugby team perform their famous Haka dance. What an afternoon we had! Full of fun and laughter!

This week, we got to celebrate our Carer Mandy Hughes' 20th year of service to Iddenshall Hall and Beeston View!

Wow, what a totally impressive length in your post Mandy! You are loved so much by the residents, families and your colleagues!

We would like to take this opportunity to say a huge THANK YOU, not only for your dedication, commitment and drive, but above all for being the shining star that you are! The homes would be lost without you, your personality shines through.

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts and here's to many more years :) Love from your family at Iddenshall Hall and Beeston View!

Our Residents at Iddenshall Hall & Beeston View really look forward to and benefit from the regular visits of Tosca and his owner Liz. Tosca is not only a beautiful golden retriever and a wonderful pet but he is also a Pet's as Therapy (PAT) dog too!

To become a therapy dog, dogs must have an incredible temperament, be able to calmly and safely navigate a huge variety of strange environments, be sociable and affectionate but also calm in greeting new people and be generally quite unflappable. Tosca, is all of this and more! He gives the best cuddles and our Residents just love him!

Our residents were very creative this week painting the Autumn and everyone really admired their magnificent creations. Each resident was free to choose colours and use the fresh autumn leaves to stimulate their vision, they also listened to music to complement the atmosphere and concentration. The result was great as we can see on our display board.

Our residents love to see this time of year, as they get to watch the leaves change colour and fall from the trees all around our beautiful grounds, just by looking out the window. We're very lucky to have the scenery we do at our home, and it makes crafts like this even more special as we have wonderful views to look out on and gardens to draw.

Our home is delighted to have established close community links with the Reverend Jim and St Helen's church in Tarporley.

Last week the Reverend visited our home along with members of the church choir and led our Residents in a service of harvest thanksgiving.This week some of our Residents took a trip out in our mini-bus to deliver harvest boxes to the church which were being collected to support the Mid Cheshire Food bank. Thank-you to all the staff, family and friends who generously donated food items for our boxes.

Having completed their important delivery, the Residents were rewarded with a trip to Snugbury's near Nantwich where they enjoyed a delicious ice-cream!

Our Macmillan Coffee morning brought residents, staff and families together around a pleasant cup of coffee, tea and cakes for this wonderful cause to help people cope with the impact of a cancer diagnosis.

Our Residents really enjoyed welcoming friends & families and helping good causes. On the other hand our cupcakes made with a main ingredient "love" added definitely pleasure & talking point throughout the morning. Also, everyone was invited to participate to get the two questionnaires 'Coffee morning' & 'Coffee Break' quizzes so we added fun by testing our knowledge about Coffee.

The most important thing was to come together for this cause, sharing among all together and support with our small donation but full of love.

National Day of Arts in Care Homes!

We joined in the celebration of this date by holding an exhibition of arts that our Residents have created over the years and very proudly presented and displayed these in the main reception area of our homes, Iddenshall Hall and Beeston View. The art mediums used between these pieces include watercolours, oils, embroidery and others.

The exhibition was on display all week at the main entrance of the home, where lots of people stopped to view the creations of our residents and offer many a compliment on their work. We have talented artists in Iddenshall Hall & Beeston View who have stood out for their art and some of them continue to express as artists here, which enriches our environment with their own creations.

Nutrition and Hydration Week aims to highlight, promote and celebrate improvements in the provision of nutrition and hydration locally, nationally and globally.

At Iddenshall Hall and Beeston View we recogise the importance of eating and drinking well to maintain good health and well being.

We celebrated 'Smoothie - Tuesday' by making our own delicious fresh fruit drinks and 'Not dry day Friday' tea - tasting with a variety of flavoured brews.

We were blessed to welcome the Revd Jim Bridgman to Beeston View. 

Residents gathered in our lounge for an afternoon of hymns, prayer and communion. The content of the service rang familiar with many of our Residents as they naturally sang along to the hymns and joined in with the Lords Prayer.

Faith being a huge part of the lives of many of our Residents, it is important that we continue to offer this opportunity to them whilst in our care.

A huge THANK YOU to Revd Jim Bridgman for partnering with our home and we look forward to welcoming you back again on a regular basis.

We all spent a fun afternoon together supporting Comic Relief.

Residents and Staff at Beeston View donned their red noses to support people facing poverty in the UK and around the world.

There was lots of laughter and groans of dismay from the Residents as they listened to bad jokes, sang and danced together and enjoyed special red nose cakes that had been freshly baked by the chefs.

We hope that you had as much fun as we did!