Our Blog
Heart to Home works hard to create an enriching activity program. Our blog captures the essence of day-to-day activities and happenings at our residential care homes. You will notice a larger emphasis on outdoor activities during the summer months and more in-house events (music therapy, pet therapy etc.) during the winter months. Given our smaller size you will also notice that our staff have frequent times where they can enjoy one-on-one activities with our residents.
Heart to Home | Easter Celebration
We had a fun Easter celebration here at Heart to Home. We started the night before by having staff hide Easter eggs throughout the homes. Then on Easter morning the residents and daytime staff had a fun Easter egg hunt throughout the homes. A fun activity to get us moving and to bring back those cherished childhood memories. We had lots of smiles and a few too many pieces of chocolate!
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Happy Valentine's Day!
Happy Valentine's Day! This month at Heart to Home we filled the house with Valentines decorations and crafts, among other fun activities. For Valentine's Day we used our fine motor, team work, and communication skills to complete many loving crafts, including a "Be My Valentine" banner, paper heart garland, and Valentine's for our hard working staff! We also engaged all of our senses by making snacks for our favorite animal friends, bird seed cakes and dog biscuits! Finally, we have had fun engaging our gross motor skills with a new parachute! It is fun for our residents of all abilities to participate in.
New Year Treats!
Happy New Year!
Here at Heart to Home we wrapped up December by making some of our favorite Christmas cookies and reminisced about our favorite holiday memories. We welcomed 2016 with a New Years party with hats, confetti, sparkling juice, and a countdown.
This week we are keeping warm making scented neck warmers with rice, tube socks, and essential oils. This required teamwork, communication, fine motor skills and upper body body strength. They sure are cozy and relaxing on cold winter days!
We are also fighting cabin fever by creating "I Spy" Puzzles out of rice, water bottles, and house hold objects, playing Bingo with our home school student visitors, and baking extra treats.
Next week we hope to visit some of the local businesses for coffee and ice cream!
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Heart to Home | Holidays
It's hard to believe 2016 is just around the corner! We have been busy as elves here at Heart to Home filling the houses with decorations and holiday treats!
The week after Thanksgiving we decorated the Christmas trees. Grabbing the ornaments and reaching for branches required a lot of fine and gross motor skills! Since then we have been busy stringing popcorn and cranberry garland, painting, creating glittery ornaments, and making our own holiday wreaths. All of these activities required decision making, motor planning, along with fine and gross motor and social skills. We also enjoyed a fun festive music concert courtesy of Joanne Bolles.
Next week we are looking forward to bringing in the new year!
Happy Turkey Day!
We created mini pilgrim hat place settings using fine motor skills and direction following. It also helps us socialize with housemates by getting to know their names!
We wanted to show our family, friends and staff how grateful we are for them by creating them homemade candy bags that look like ears of corn. This required a lot of concentration and fine motor skills.
Finally using gross motor, fine motor, teamwork and communication skills, we created adorable turkey wreaths.
We are looking forward to enjoying a home made Thanksgiving meal and spending time with friends and family; we are thankful for this week!
Fall Festivities
We also utilized out fine motor skills and awakened our senses while making tasty apple pie bites! The smells of warm apples and cinnamon brought back memories of cool fall days in Minnesota.
The residents at Hilltop Manor also took advantage of a few good days of weather by walking around and exploring their new neighborhood!
Cooking Puppy Chow
Here we are making up some tasty treats on a cool fall day. We can't wait to taste one of our favorite recipes; puppy chow!
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All Things Fall
Last week at Heart to Home we celebrated all things fall. One of our favorite sports is football, and we were able to exercise our arms and coordination with our football themed bean bags. Next we utilized our fine motor and creative skills and worked on some spooky Halloween decorations. The week wasn't complete without seeing how much the leaves have changed. The residents at Mendakota Manor took a walk down to a nearby pond and enjoyed beautiful fall weather and sights! Finally the residents at Mendakota Manor worked on dehydrating apples which will go towards creating a fall apple wreath. Thank you Orchard Hills Apple Orchard for donating the apples!
Pumpkin Painting
In celebration of the season we worked on painting pumpkins at Mendakota Manor. It was fun to work with the paint and let our creative juice's flow. As you can see from the photos there were many smiles had by all!
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Pumpkins & Flowers
This week we prepared for fall at Mendota and Mendakota Manor! We awoke our senses this week by smelling and guessing different seasonal spices, such as nutmeg, cinnamon, and vanilla. Then we took advantage of our flower gardens and enjoyed smelling, touching, and viewing the colors the beautiful flowers. We used our fine motor skills and creativity to create fall flower arrangements for both houses. We also decorated the house with pumpkins we painted ourselves! Finally, fall preparation isn't completed without watching trees turn colors! It was a perfect brisk fall day for a walk in the neighborhood to check out the vivid fall colors!
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