Activities at Sutton Valence Care Home
Our activities team are great at building the activities programme around the likes and interests of the people we care for. Ensuring that our social events offer fun and adventure is part of the ethos of our home; it’s important that those we support can enjoy an active and social lifestyle. Of course, there will always be those who prefer peace and quiet, and in these instances, a cup of tea and a chat are always welcomed.
Gemma Bhandari
My name is Gemma I am an Activities coordinator at Sutton Valence care home. I have been working here for nine years and love it. I grew up in Sutton valence village and attended the local Primary school.
I have always been passionate about the care of others and enjoy enriching the lives of our Residents. I have a Diploma in Health and social care and have worked in private health care for over 14 years. I have always loved performing arts and studied this at school. I am a very proud Mother to Amaya and Jacob.
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 Sutton Valence Care Home
Family Reunions
The long awaited reunion with one family member has become a reality, as one single named visitor is now allowed to visit each resident in their bedroom.
There has been much anticipation of this moment by families and residents alike. Guidance was issued by the government on 9th March, and Barchester is proceeding with a safe and cautious approach to visiting. Strict protocols are in place, with all visitors required to have a negative Lateral Flow Device test result before being allowed into the home, and infection control measures and social distancing are in place for every visit, with hand holding allowed but not recommended.
Despite the need for testing and social distancing, it was still welcome news for so many residents and their family members to be able to meet in the comfort of their bedroom. Residents and their relatives enjoyed getting together and catching up face to face.
This is the first cautious step towards having a buzz of visitors in the home again. It was wonderful to see how happy it made the residents and their relatives. We have a great booking system in place to ensure the visits are well organised, and visitors are doing a great job of following the safety measures to keep everyone as safe as possible. For those that are not able to come inside the home we are pleased to be able to continue to offer visits in our visiting suites or outdoors when the weather allows.
Mother's Day
Residents celebrated Mother’s Day with a tea party and video calls with their families. Our General Manager also gifted every resident with a potted plant for the occasion. The home was beautifully decorated with fresh flowers and bunting for the occasion.
Staff at Sutton Valence arranged inclusive celebrations, including music and games, an afternoon tea, discussions about how the role of the mother has changed, reminiscences about the residents’ childhoods and much more.
Sutton Valence
Residents celebrated Mother’s Day with video calls to family, flowers for all our ladies and afternoon bingo.
Staff arranged flowers for every resident, music and games, afternoon bingo, discussions about how the role of being a mother has changed and reminiscences about the residents’ childhood
Although Mothers day may be a little different this year, we have pulled out all the stops in ensure our residents have a great day and make the day special for everyone.
Valentine's Day
Sutton Valence was filled with flowers, cards and sweets in celebration of St Valentine’s Day.
Staff and residents celebrated the day of love by giving hearts, creating heart-shaped decorations to decorate the home and gifting each other home-made sweets.
It’s been a very different Valentine’s Day, but we’ve all had a lovely day nonetheless. Lots of our residents were able to see their loved ones, either using our visiting suite or on a video call. We’ve had a whole range of treats and Valentine’s-themed fun, and we have enjoyed every moment of it!
Elvis' Birthday
Sutton Valence was transformed into Graceland to mark what would have been Elvis Presley’s 86th birthday on 8th January.
It is estimated that Elvis has sold over one billion records worldwide, so to honour the undisputed King of Rock & Roll, the staff and residents enjoyed a fantastic day of music, fun and dancing.
Lots of our residents are big Elvis fans and love his music. We had a fantastic day listening to all his hits, finding out about his early life and what influenced him and watching old Elvis movies — he was such an incredible talent!
In the afternoon, we had an Elvis quiz, it is amazing how many songs he recorded. We all surprised ourselves by how many we remembered!
Our resident community engaged and participated fully in creating a photo board of their favourite Elvis photos that they could chat and reminisce about during the day.
The Christmas Spirit
Sutton Valence residents have been busy decorating our home for Christmas with help from the in-house activities team.
Lead project resident, Adele, has been incredibly creative with the beautiful, detailed and unique centrepiece and the hand-carved pieces made by Adele herself.
We can’t wait to share the photos of the finished piece soon. The entire conservatory has been transformed into a winter wonderland forest with life-sized trees hand-painted on all windows by Emily Wheelhouse, our Activities Coordinator
