Sensory Christmas ideas

Season's Greetings!

If you find yourself at a loss over the Christmas/New Year holidays why not take time out away from the usual routine and have a go at some of our seasonal activities?  They're ideal for getting all the family involved.

It's not too late to hang some home-made spiced 'razzle dazzle' to the Christmas tree with glittery round oases pinned with chillies and star anise;  hang sliced and dried oranges with bundles of cinnamon too and bring some sensory seasonal smells indoors.

Going out on a walk?  collect twigs, leaves, pine cones and make a Nature Mobile - something the whole family can join in with.  You can add bits and pieces from home too; cinnamon sticks, holly/ivy from the garden, left-over cranberries etc. Whatever you like.

And let's not forget food for the garden birds.  A home-made bird food ladder not only helps the robins and finches etc but adds a splash of colour to your garden too - guaranteed a conversation 'starter'!

You can use up old bits of fruit such as apples and pears and berries, bread, popcorn, bacon rind etc.  Just string them along some garden wire and wrap it around both ends of several twigs as you go along.

There are lots of ideas and activity sheets on our website; just click HERE 

We hope you have a wonderful, creative, enjoyable, sensory-rich Christmas and New Year!



Wendy

The birds and the trees

Launceston, Truro and Mullion........we certainly travelled around the County last week!

At Launceston Memory Cafe we showed members how to make functional yet attractive bird feeders using natural materials they can gather from their own gardens and chunks of fruit and fat balls mixed with bird seed.

Hung in a garden these feeders provide perches and food for the birds and add colour to the garden this time of year, particularly if your trees and hedges are pretty bare at the moment.

It works well for 2 people, making it an ideal activity to support Dementia care at home. You can add as much or as little food as you like to the feeder.  Most important is the time you spend together in the activity.  It should be a time of fulfilling moments; of conversation, memories, future dreams, smiles and giggles.

Mullion Memory Cafe provided another opportunity for us to trial our new Sensory Tree activity with people living with Dementia.  The photos show how brilliant they all were at using their initiative and creativity in a way that resulted in each tree being unique to the individual person; reflecting their personal connections with nature and their past.

In between the trips to the memory cafes was a morning workshop with a group of  Age UK Facilitators - what a giggly bunch they were!  This group of volunteers befriend older people living in the mid County area, including people living with Dementia, some of them also provide CST (Cognitive Stimulation Therapy).

Armed with a table full of plants, leaves, flowers, pine cones, hazel sticks and lots of coloured twine and ribbon, they chatted and laughed their way through our Nature Mobile activity.  They'll take that experience away with them and use the activity to stimulate that kind of positive emotion in the people they support.

Wendy
Creative Spaces Project Manager