Activities at Kernow House Care Home
Our Activities Coordinators organise varied and regular events. The activities that take place depend on what our residents tell us they are interested in and the feedback we get from their families. We currently have pop-up cafes where we socialise and maybe visit the hairdresser. We have regular live music events, a storyteller and visits from animals and we are often joined by families or friends during our social activities where they are always most welcome.
Living in Cornwall the surrounding countryside offers many beauty spots and we often have trips out to wherever our residents would like to go. At other times a walk to nearby shops or cafes is what we enjoy.
Louise is our hairdresser and she is with us twice a week. Louise also supports us during our weekly Namaste sessions where she offers hand massages in a relaxing environment. Every Thursday afternoon we have a time of worship supported by our local community. Our ice cream van, Kernow Kones, and our mobile pub, Kernow Keg, also make a weekly appearance. We have monthly clubs, when we play bingo or watch a film in our pop-up cinema. Residents on all units are invited to take part in a monthly Resident’s Meeting and they tell us what they would like.
Apart from these regular events, we also celebrate special occasions and often have musical entertainers to visit but we also make our own fun. All staff take part in fancy dress or charity events that we support and often what we do evolves through interaction between residents and care or activity staff. All this makes Kernow House a vibrant place to be where things happen both as group activities as well as on an individual level.
Bea Porup
Bea has many years of experience working in elderly care and both experience and training in dementia care. She has also worked extensively with people with Huntington's disease. Bea works closely with Sue, Jackie and our management team, nurses, carers and kitchen team to ensure our home has a vibrant environment with lots of events happening and varied opportunities for having both new and familiar experiences, making sure the people living here lead a rich and fulfilling life.
Read our brochure 'Life-enriching activities' for more information about life in our care homes.
Read our brochure
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 Kernow House Care Home
World Bee Day
Our gardener, Tony, has been very busy making our outdoor spaces ready for the summer, and residents are gardening in the unit gardens, but we have heard that bees are having a difficult time.
We used World Bee Day to read up and learn the importance of having pollinators in our gardens. We have painted bee houses in bright colours and when the rains stops, so we can get out and place them around the gardens, we will keep a keen eye on them.
Hopefully soon, we will have resident bees helping us make the gardens even more beautiful.
Mental Health Awareness Week
We have focused on mental health with daily cafes, where we have been able to socialise, chat and look at all the support material available to residents, as well as staff. Launceston Lions donated lots of Trauma Teds, which have been shared out to anyone, who would like something to hold. We have exercised with the Green Goddess during a Live Talk and we are finishing off the week by celebrating National Biscuit Day. A busy week with lots of positive things to do!
International Nurses' Day
We celebrated our wonderful nurses with chocolates and thank you cards on International Nurses' Day. It was Florence Nightingale’s birthday, so the rest of the home learnt about her, did word searches and quizzes about nursing and looked at some of the equipment that the nurses use every day. It’s good to know that we are in safe hands.
A Royal Tea Party
We have watched lots of programmes about Prince Philip and his funeral because many of us have a keen interest in the royal family. We thought it fitting that we then celebrated the Queen’s birthday on National Tea Day with a special tea party complete with cream tea. Being so close to the Devon border, we had many discussions about what comes first: the cream or the jam. We also had quizzes about the royal family.
Live Talk
Barchester arranged live talks with various topics and from different people. The latest talk was about creating the V&A in Dundee. We have a small group of residents who sit comfortably with a cup of coffee and listen to the talks from their armchairs. There are many more talks planned and we look forward to them.
Grand National
We have had a little flutter on the horses and held our own sweepstakes for the Grand National. We had two: one selling horses for a pound and one just for fun with a nice box of biscuits for the winner. Needless to say, we also had many discussions about the rights and wrongs about horse racing, traditions and principles.
