Activities at St Thomas Care Home
Our activities coordinator is dedicated to organising meaningful activities on an individual and group basis to fulfill the daily needs of our residents, as we understand how important mental and physical stimulation is for their wellbeing. Our activities are available to everyone who wants to take part and there is something different going on everyday. We often go out on day trips including visiting shopping centres, garden centres, evening meals at the local pubs, visits to local schools and also coffee mornings with other care homes. We have a wide range of entertainers that visit us at our home including musical therapists, Millers Ark Farm, pantomimes as well as our local salvation army and lots more. We encourage families to join us on trips out and also in home activities such as baking, arts and crafts, dancing and singing, we believe this is a great way for our residents to live an active and fun life here with us at St Thomas.
Teresa Humphreys
Hello. My name is Teresa. I am the Dementia Champion here at St. Thomas Care Home
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 St Thomas Care Home
Traditional VE Day street party!
On Saturday staff members and residents marked the anniversary of VE Day, also known as Victory in Europe Day, by organising a variety of special activities.
The home was specially decorated with flags and banners for the occasion, and at 11am everyone gathered together for a two minute silence as token of appreciation to the heroes of World War II.
In the afternoon, the residents were treated to a very traditional street party, complete with lunch boxes in the conservatory, and raised a glass to the nation, showing gratitude to “those who gave so much”. Music played in the background as residents enjoyed a really great ‘knees up’!
Residents handmade wreath laid at Cenotaph
Residents are out and about on the mini bus again and were able to take a trip out today into Basingstoke. With a beautiful handmade wreath, made by the residents they went to lay it at the Basingstoke Cenotaph to commemorate VE day and pay their respects.
All that Jazz!
Staff and residents celebrated International Jazz Day on April 30 by creating their very own day-long festival of jazz complete with local jazz musician Omari Johnson-Daley who played in the visiting suite for residents!
International Jazz Day highlights the diplomatic role jazz plays in uniting people from all corners of the globe. Jazz music was originally a blend of African, Latin and European forms and styles that first became popular in the 1920s.
Staff and residents at the home marked the day with a whole host of fun activities, they learned the history of jazz and indulged in the tasting of various prohibition cocktails.
General Manager, Fatmata Cochrane said: “Lots of our residents are big jazz fans so we had to celebrate International Jazz Day. They really enjoyed picking out their favourite tracks, reminiscing about how they came to love jazz and what it meant to them at different times of their lives. I think we also had some jazz converts today!”
We went on a visit to the Zoo today!
Residents and staff were treated to an exciting virtual tour of Five Sisters Zoo, hosted by Head of Education, Adam Welsh.
Five Sisters Zoo is a family run zoo with over 160 different animal species from around the world. Originally a garden centre that helped to rehome unwanted pets, the animal collection grew and grew until the zoo was officially founded in 2005. Now Five Sisters Zoo is the most visited wildlife attraction in West Lothian.
Gone are the days when a visit to the zoo was merely a fun day out. Adam’s presentation showed all the hard work that goes on behind the scenes at the zoo and explored the vital conservation, rescue and education work carried out at Five Sisters.
The session explored the fascinating rescue stories behind four lions and five European bears, before highlighting the vital Eurasian beaver conservation work that is carried out. Some other highlights included finding out about how and why Five Sisters Zoo helped to re-home two female snow leopards and discovering the captive breeding programmes they are involved with.
Adam says: “We really enjoyed being able to show the Barchester residents some of the fantastic animals we have at Five Sisters Zoo, we are very proud of the work our brilliant teams do. We were just so happy to be able to share our passion for wildlife conservation and animal rescue.”
Arranging flowers from our garden
Residents spent a morning arranging flowers we had collected from our own garden, no miles travelled so very Eco friendly! We displayed the vases around the home for everyone to enjoy and it felt like Spring was really here
Heartwarming visits for residents
We have been welcoming nominated visitors into the home since early March and now residents can see more of their loved ones in the garden to enjoy afternoon tea or a special birthday celebration. It was a delight for a four legged visitor to come and see a resident in their room - you can see in the picture the joy on her face after nearly a year apart
