That You Santa Claus!

Louis Armstrong sang the song, “Zat  You Santa Claus?”, and we love it because it reminds us of the holidays. In honor of this song and the season, we always want to make sure that we give more than we receive. So, it’s important to the entire team of Juniper Village at Louisville that our residents receive   gifts around the holidays; that even though some of their families can’t spend time with them, that they in our thoughts.

Again, please take a look at some of the pictures (once we’re able to get them posted), all of our residents received at least one gift, and they really felt honored to be at a community that takes this to heart and cares about the traditions, large and small.

Gifts For Everyone!

Jingle Jangle

We had our annual visit by St. Nicholas. In our humble opinion, St. Nicholas is a young and jolly fellow who comes by with well-wishes for everyone (at the very least, that is what our experiences have led us to believe). This is a slightly edited version to describe this delightfully jolly fellow who graced us with his presence (although, we honestly believe that the pictures do a better job than our words, so make sure to look at those too).

“The stockings were hung by the chimney with care in hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there.  He was dressed all in fur from his head to his foot and his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot. A bundle of toys he had flung on his back and he looked like a peddler just opening his sack. His eyes how they twinkled, his dimples so merry, his cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry. The beard on his chin was as ginger as a red bow. We laughed when we saw him in spite of ourselves. A wink of his eye, and a twist of his head soon gave us to know we had nothing to dread. We heard him exclaim, Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!”

Juniper Village at Louisville Loves the holiday traditions, make sure to check out our next blog about our holiday celebration with the residents in our community.

Giving Thanks for All We Have

The holiday season is upon us, and is in full swing. If you're feeling anything like we do, we just can't believe that we are already in the month of November, practically on our way to wrapping up the end of the year. Despite the fact that the days are shorter, and time is moving much too quickly, we do like to take this time of year to say thanks for everything that we're so incredibly blessed to have.

Juniper Village at Louisville would like to say a special thank you to our residents, they truly brighten our day each and every single day. Their wit and wisdom makes the work that we do enjoyable. We would also like to thank our families, who allow us to care for their loved ones day in and day out, and also for being able to create relationships with them as well and work toward a unified goal of providing the best care possible (which extends beyond the work that we do here at the Village and out into the community). It is this foundation which enables us to care and give back, and for that we are exceptionally thankful.

To celebrate our thanks, we invited our residents, friends, and families to join us this past weekend for a Thanksgiving Day Feast. Our Chef, Abhaya, and his team, created a truly wonderful feast with turkey, stuffing, and all of the trimmings. Our wonderful friends and families provided us with desserts to share with one another. It was a day that celebrated giving thanks; so, thank you to everyone who helps make us what we are and supports us in our endeavors.

Woodland Creatures Rule the Nest

If this is your first time joining us on this blog, then you don't know how exceptionally serious we are about celebrating Halloween, and not just celebrating Halloween, but celebrating it in costume. Every year we celebrate this wonderful holiday by dressing up as our favorite woodland creatures. On this special day, it would not be unusual to find gnomes running around the hallways frolicking with deer, fairies, bunnies, swans, owls, or any of our favorite woodland friends. This year, we even had a crow and dragon roaming the halls (he was, of course, a friendly dragon).

After everyone is ready and in costume, we share the holiday fun with some of our favorite kids from Monarch Elementary School. This year, we gave away goodies such as bouncy balls, poppers, stickers, eraser tops, pretzels, and more to the ghosts and ghouls of the school (and other characters as well, we don't differentiate between costumes, we share with all!)

If you've never celebrated events with us, now is the time to join in on the fun. Our next big event will be November 23rd at 12 Noon, and we will be celebrating Thanksgiving Day with our Residents, friends, and family. We provide the main course; we just ask that visitors bring their favorite dessert to share. It is truly a day to be grateful for everything that we have, especially the relationships that we've built in our community.

Handing Out Goodie Bags to the Kids Coming through

Pooh Bear Came to Work

Puss n' Boots from Shrek gathered goodies

A beautiful Swan made friends with the Pink Power Ranger

Group Picture of the Woodland Friends Hanging out together

Chili Cook-Off

If there is one thing we love more about the cool, crisp air during Fall, it's the fact that it's time for chili! We pulled out our scarves, boots, and sweaters in preparation for our 3rd annual chili cook-off (ignore the fact that we weren't wearing scarves in the picture...they were on in spirit).

We were fortunate to have the Louisville Fire Department here to judge which chili was the best. Hats off to the Family Hospice team, who won by leaps and bounds this year for the best chili. Voting was based off of 5 criteria: smell, thickness, color, flavor and aftertaste. The next highest vote was 12 points behind the winning chili (if that tells you anything about how incredibly good it was).

Our winner received a fantastic give away, which included a gift card to Lulu's Barbecue in Downtown Louisville. Please make sure to join us next year for one of our favorite annual events!

Enjoying the Chili Cook-Off festivities

Scoring and the Scores

Taking Time out to play ball during the serious business of chili taste testing

Staff enjoying the fixings

Some of the chili was HOT!

The Wining Team with the Louisville Fire Department

Roald Dahl's Fancy Fictional Friends Celebration

Roald Dahl is a beloved children's writer who would have celebrated his birthday on September 13th; he would have been 97 this year. He blessed us with stories such as Matilda, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, The BFG, James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and many other wonderful children's stories.

In honor of his work we decided to host a special event here at our community because by our standards Roald Dahl is one of the best writers EVER, and that is noteworthy and that deserves to be celebrated! He created fictional characters; who not unlike the BFG, have stayed our friends since we first read his stories.

The best part about his works of fiction is that there is always a lesson to be learned,  and a way for us to sympathize with the protagonist. His stories are as relevant today as they were when they were first written, they have a sense of timelessness that can always be applied to current times.

To honor his works we decided to focus on Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, there was a special surprise visit by Willy Wonka himself...and naturally he gave away caramel apple suckers...he owns a candy factory, how could he not share some of his candy with the residents! He also graced us with a wonderful performance about "Pure Imagination." Next up we met Veruca Salt who showed up to perform her infamous song "I Want It Now," some things in life don't change, and Veruca's outlook on getting what she wants is certainly one of them! We ended with the Oompa Loompa's dancing around the room. Many of the characters from this story were there with the exception of Charlie, who is now  much too busy with running the factory, in his absence he was able to send some Oompa Loompa's, which is much appreciated!

Our residents were able to socialize with Mike Teavee, Augustus Gloop, Violet Beauregarde, Veruca Salt, Willy Wonka, and some Oompa Loompa's.

Please feel free to stop by for any of our future events. At Juniper we really believe in celebrating life in all of it's seasons, and hosting events like these is one way to do that! Our next event is Friday, October 18th at 2:00PM...it's entitled "Apple of Our Eye." We will be celebrating National Apple Month and we will have a lot of fun things to do (such as eating caramel apples, yum!)

Willy Wonka, excited to share her latest invention!

Veruca Salt and Violet Beauregarde share their
experienceson the tour at the Chocolate Factory.

 

 

Oompa Loompa's perform their skit...dancing, and singing
is a side talent and helps make working more fun!

 

 

Mike Teavee speaks to the residents about playing too many
video games and how he has kicked the habit of being so lazy.

 

 

Augustus Gloop talks about how he likes chocolate TOO much.

 

Group Photo...excluding Veruca who decided she did not want to
be in the photo...she either wants it now or she doesn't!

 

It's All Fun and Games at a Carnival!

We kicked off National Assisted Living Week with a Carnival..even though it was raining and we had to move things inside, we still had a great time. We were of course disappointed that due to the rain we had to forgo the Giraffe Bounce house...but there will always be next year!

We had clowns making balloon hats and dogs, we had a Conk the Crow Game, and Balloon Blowing game, and many other Carnival Favorites. Some of our Fellowship Residents got in on the action too by wearing some of their very own clown attire. And who has a carnival without having cut-outs to take pictures with (not us...and any good carnival worth it's weight will have these too!)

Cotton candy was of course a must for the Carnival...this year we splurged and got Lemon Lime and Pina Colada flavored cotton candy on top of the traditional pink & blue flavors. There was also some elephant ear, and other carnival food to be enjoyed (and isn't carnival food some of the best food around...unhealthy, but delicious!)

Please feel free to stop by for any of the events that we host at the community. We love to make our residents smile, and hosting events like these are one of the ways that we are able to do that (we did have to also forgo the Pie throwing contest...but we'll find time to do it again soon!)





Jillian and Bill getting ready to check out Carnival Games

  

A Seriously Sad and Happy and Glad Clowns

Cut-Out Photos are so much fun!

 

Balloon Game...who will be the winner?

Funny Faces (clown paint not necessary)

The Crowd Approves of the Carnival!

Carnival Fencing...why who wouldn't want to get in on that action!

A Crowd of Clowns spells T-R-O-U-B-L-E.

 Games are all good and fun as long as nobody gets hurt (and nobody did!)

Group Photo of Seriously Silly Clowns