Activities at The Fernes Care Home
At The Fernes we endeavour to make our care as personal as possible, including when it comes to activities. We will give you a 'Getting to Know Me' booklet for you to fill out with your loved one before they arrive, which includes a little life history and a tick sheet for a vast amount of activities. This enables us to offer the activities we know they will enjoy and enables us to learn valuable information about their lives and what might stimulate them in conversations and trips.
Our specialist Activities and Lifestyle staff make sure there are always meaningful activities to take part in, such as helping in the garden, baking some bread to have with our dinner, and trips out to various locations nearby such as the beach and the garden centres. Residents are encouraged to take part, but it is always the resident’s choice to participate or not as we believe that having choice is very important to help our residents feel in control of their lives. There are activities on offer every day (and night for those night owls) in the form of word puzzles, jigsaw puzzles, arts and crafts, needle crafts and board games to name a few. We have entertainment that is organised at least twice a month such as Music for Health, Zoolab or musicians, and also have a wonderful Yoga instructor who comes every other week.
Activities are provided by everyone in our home from carers and specialised activities staff, right through to our admin team. If there is a task that needs doing and a resident would like to do it, such as sealing envelopes and putting stamps on or handing out popcorn for our Movie Mondays, they are very welcome to help out which enables us to give them a better feeling of purpose and self-worth.
We are a registered member of the National Activity Providers Association (NAPA), which means that we are always working to make the quality of life of all of our residents as high as possible by working with person-centred activities that aim to stimulate our residents, both mentally and physically.
Sophie Wasteney
Hi, I'm Sophie, I am the Activities Lead at The Fernes. I've worked in the care sector for 26 years and here at The Fernes for 3 of those. When I started here I worked in care so really got to know the residents, relatives and home very well. When the Activities Lead role arose I naturally jumped at the opportunity as it was one aspect of care I really wanted to do as I really enjoy making people happy. As you cannot put a price on a smile!
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 The Fernes Care Home
Virtual Cruise
Our staff and residents were treated to a wonderful virtual cruise and interactive cooking demo. Enjoying mocktails, exotic dishes and mystery destinations. While following Chef Paul’s live interactive cookery demo, our amazing Head Chef, Adam, here in the home, prepared the same recipes for our residents to try. They loved experiencing food from around the world and virtual visiting these amazing countries.
Lee Victory Festival
Residents had the most wonderful time attending Lee Victory Festival throughout the weekend, enjoying the military parade, vintage singers, church services, choirs and so many more moments, which took them back in time. Even hearing the war guns being fired brought a smile to so many faces of the men who served for years in the forces.
Macmillan Coffee Morning
We participated in our Macmillan Coffee Morning with a lovely morning in the sun, raising money for such a great cause. We managed to raise over £70 and we couldn’t be happier.
Congratulations, Rachel!
Rachel Anderson has beaten all the competition to win the Community Engagement Award in the Barchester Care Awards 2021.
The Barchester Care Awards celebrate the staff who go the extra mile for the benefit of the 12,000 residents living in Barchester’s 248 care homes and private hospitals across the country. Categories range from ‘Registered Nurse of the Year’ and ‘Carer of the Year’ to ‘Dementia Care Champion’ and ‘Activities Coordinator of the Year’.
More than 2,900 nominations were received from homes and hospitals across the UK. All entries were a very high standard and Rachel is over the moon to have been named the national winner in this category.
Visit by Olympic Medalist Declan Brooks!
Residents and staff cheered on Team GB throughout the Tokyo Olympics and were delighted to meet their local medalist, Declan Brooks this week. Everyone at the home has loved seeing all of our amazing Olympians progress so to hear Declan’s journey and to hold his medal was the icing on the cake
Resident, Joan, commented: “I absolutely loved watching the Olympics, it was wonderful to be able to cheer on our team and now to meet Declan and hold his medal is a highlight, it’s so kind for him to give his time to come and see residents in a care home!“
Cassie Munnoch, General Manager at the home, said: “It was fantastic to be able to cheer on all of Team GB and watch our talented sportsmen and women bringing home medals in so many diverse sports, residents were delighted to sign Declan’s card and had some great questions prepared for his visit – starting with how many bones have you broken? The photos we took with Declan and residents are being shared with all their families all over the world”.
Delivering our donation to RSPCA's Stubbington Ark!
We took our mini bus and have been over to the RSPCA's Stubbington Ark to meet the team at this amazing site and all see all the care they provide. We took our donation of £250 that was raised at our dog show on Saturday! Thank you so much to everyone that came, showed their support and donated to this wonderful charity, every penny counts.
Residents had a great time meeting all the animals!
