Staying Positive – COVID 19

Head Office

With thanks to a kind donor, we have a supply of games to distribute to people we support.

A special meeting at Lindisfarne Court, Darlington

Graham was able see his parents in person for the first time since lock down and let’s just say we had a very happy Graham. FaceTiming is great to keep in touch, but not the same as being in the same room, albeit at a safe/social distance.

Two special birthdays..

Darren at Balmaclellan, celebrating with lots of presents from his family who came to visit by social distancing through the window. Darren has had a brilliant day, laughing and the odd tear of joy 🙂

And Happy Birthday to Karen at Bradford Supported Living Services. Lots of presents, cake and the odd bottle of something nice to drink. 😉

Brentwood, Leyburn

Here is Pamela keeping herself busy during lockdown. She has certainly mastered the art of pom pom making and we had so many that we have decided to decorate the garden area and have a colourful pom pom tree to lift everyone’s spirits.

Dalby View, Coulby Newham

Our fabulous party celebrating Saint John of God week, we had a Portuguese theme with a cheese entre for starter, Bacalhau com natas for main and Portuguese carrot and cinnamon cake for desert, with Portuguese wine and lots of little nibbles to accompany, we all had an amazing time.

Bradford Supported Living Services

Yesterday, Alex and Brendon escaped lockdown to enjoy some fish and chips and an ice cream.... let's just say it was enjoyed by all!

Dalby View, Coulby Newham

Enjoying a walk and some traffic watching.

And relaxing afterwards..

Dalby View, Coulby Newham

Mcdonald’s opens at last! Enjoying a Mcflurry..

Northern Supported Living Services

Scorton High tea at Scorton.. thanks to Scorton Buddies for their delivery to each of the houses.

Dalby View, Coulby Newham

Last weekend in May – perfect weather for a barbeque.

Sandown Road

Here are just a few of our VE celebrations at Sandown to start it was a traditional lunch of fish, chips and mushy pea’s and the dancing dinosaur made another appearance 😀

Balmaclellan

Here is Darren having a lovely visit from his Aunty Pam, who visited every week without fail so it was lovely that she has come today 😀

Lindisfarne Court

Received this wonderful gift from Janet Strong, mum of Jack. Thank you!

Dalby View

Enjoying indoor games with Giant Connect 4!

Sandown Road

A tasty delivery of cakes from a colleague’s sister and a lovely thank you card and a box of chocolates from a family of one of the people we support.

Bradford Supported Living Services

Enjoying the sunshine. Cheers!

Lindisfarne Court

Clapping for Carers!

Bradford Supported Living

Celebrating VE Day in style.

Brentwood, Leyburn

Here at Brentwood we were gifted 12 knitted hearts, so that the tenants could keep one and send one to a loved one who they can’t see at the present time. We then worked on creating a poem, which we have posted out to people’s loved ones. Click here to enlarge the poem

The Minims

Enjoying a slice of cake after a good music and sing-along session!

Bradford Supported Living

Alex and Brendon enjoy a well-deserved cup of tea after completing their 2.6 Challenge to wash 26 cars over 6 days, and raise £260. They did it and raised just over £268!

Lindisfarne Court

Happy Birthday Captain Tom! Saluting this 100-year-old hero and all the heroes in the NHS and social care, our colleagues and people we support at Lindisfarne Court in Darlington celebrated with this in mind, and had great fun into the bargain.

Brentwood, Leyburn

A Group Hug for Steven Allinson who was the recipient of a goody bag, courtesy of the local community including shops and local businesses. Steven was nominated for this much deserved ‘hug’ by this daughter. Click here or on group hug letter image to enlarge to read.

Dalby View

Dalby view doing a spot of gardening!

Sandown Road

Week 6 of lock down.. Some lovely cards received at the weekend of family past and present and some goodies 😀

1 Bede’s Close, Bradford

Staying Safe and Staying Healthy

Dalby View

Our Staying Positive Board: capturing all the great things we have been doing and all the fabulous comments we have received.

Dalby View

Another fun day at Dalby playing dominoes and preparing for X-Factor, and Alan enjoying the harmonica.

Dalby View

Clapping for carers.

The Minims

Everyone is very busy and creative here at the Minims!

Dalby View

Our evening exercise session.

The Minims

Bingo!

Dalby View

Celebrating 100% in their quality audit with an amazing cake!

SJOG Services – North

Kay our operations manager and her daughter Millie delivering PPE around to services in the north.

Sandown Road

Over the Easter weekend, we had a very special guest at Sandown in the form of the Easter Bunny 😀

Lindisfarne Court

We were delighted to receive a donation of Easter eggs for all the people who use the service and our colleagues. Thank you so much to Morrisons and associated local charity! 😀

Dalby View

Eggcellent times over the Easter weekend!

The Minims

More amazing Easter hats!

Terry Yorath House

Spirits are high and the Easter hats were terrific. Lots of fun and things going on!

Dalby View

“Who says isolation is boring when you have all these sensory lights. A delivery has just arrived adding more to my collection I can’t take my eyes off them!” J

The Minims

Keeping fit!

The Minims

Outdoor games in the sunshine.

Balmaclellan

Enjoying the sunshine and wonderful views.

The Minims

Enjoying some fun indoor activities.

Lindisfarne Court

Best wishes from us all. Keep safe!

Dalby View

Easter bonnet making ready for our competition on Sunday!

Brentwood, Northern Supported Living Services

All ready for Easter!

The Minims

Our rainbows hands!

Lindisfarne Court

Staying safe and taking the hand-washing techniques very seriously.

The Minims

Craft and gardening activities at the weekend.

Bradford Supported Living

Oakleigh’s window rainbows.

Dalby View

I’ve got a new helper with his own ID badge 😀

Dalby View

Bingo and karaoke afternoon at Dalby View.

Brentwood, Northern Supported Living Services

This weekend our colleagues supported people to get creative and embrace the stay safe rainbows that are becoming an emblem of hope across the country.

Dalby View

Our colleagues staying positive.

Balmaclellan

Hello from sunny North Yorkshire. Here at Balmaclellan we have brightened up the conservatory to thank all the key workers in these testing times, the support that we are receiving at the present from our local district nurses is out of this world. They are amazing.

The Minims

Enjoying indoor games!

Sandown Road

At Sandown Road we have decided to turn our windows into a work of art. Every day we add something else. Who knows what next week will bring 😀

Dalby View

DM keeping positive wishing he was sunbathing in Portugal.

Head office

Our busy HR team – staying positive during their daily video call.

North Supported Living Services

The ladies in house 5 are keeping passers-by smiling.

Bradford Supported Living Services

Keeping busy at 5 Bede’s
It’s too cold today so we moved the garden inside….

And the finished result!

Dalby View

Just a few more pictures to keep everyone smiling!

Dalby View

Another lovely picture to keep us motivated!

Outdoor games at the Minims

Dalby View

Stay positive, play monopoly and put the rest to shame.

31-3-20 - Keeping positive at Dalby View!

We have a resident chef helping to prepare tea and two artists putting their colouring skills into practice.

Painting Rainbows at Sandown Road

Here's the Terry Yorath crew painting rainbows.

Dalby View

In this difficult time of Covid-19 spreading at such a pace Rebecca has taken on her very own Infection Control Champion in Graham Turnball to help her carry out handwashing competencies and ensure staff and people who use the service stay safe.

Infection Control Champion

Lindisfarne Court, Darlington

PC and Ed enjoyed baking rhubarb crumble. Keeping a safe distance.

Balmaclellan, Catterick Village

From all the residents and staff at Balmaclellan, North Yorkshire hope you are all doing well and keeping yourself safe in these worrying times, we are trying to keep up our spirits, sadly not the alcoholic type, shame 😀, we have got all the old CDs out and having a sing song, “Moon River” at the moment, need to learn the words lol.

Please take care of yourselves and stay positive.

Northern Supported Living Services – Scorton

Don’t forget a walk will do you good, but stay safe!

Sandown Road

Hope everyone is doing well from all of us at sunny Sandown Road. We would like to say keep safe. And from Caroline who is taking this very serious and keeping us all safe at Sandown

Bradford Supported Living Services

So Alex has another job while the office is closed, never tell me you miss work.

Bingo !!! All staying positive at Dalby

The Minims

Lockdown or not we still eat cake and celebrate birthdays at The Minims

The Minims

The guys at number 12 The Minims playing games today!

Dalby View enjoying lunch in the sunshine!!

Bradford Supported Living Services

Alex has moved temporarily to Aberdeen with his friend Karen as both are over 70! Karen is loving Alex been with her as you can tell 😀

Bradford Supported Living Services

Brendon is spending plenty of time completing his jigsaws he started months and months ago! Hopefully he will finally finish one!

And Stephen has had his routine interrupted but has found solace in the back garden building bonfires !!!! Everyone is doing fantastic and are accepting the change really well.

Bradford Supported Living Services

Enjoying the sunshine!

Story

Hi, my name is Amanda.

I am a support worker at Terry Yorath House in Leeds, a service for adults with physical and sensory impairments. I have worked here for 7 years.

When the Corona Virus was first announced on TV, I didn’t really pay much attention as it was in China and didn’t really affect us here in the UK, a bit like Ebola and all the other flus and things.

However, as time went on, I realised that this was serious and my I thought ‘oh dear this is a bit scary’. I am more worried about my family (my mum is recovering from lung cancer and both my sons have asthma) and the people who we support at TYH who are all vulnerable.

At times I am terrified, I live on my own and since the lock down it can become very lonely, however all I need to do is pick up the phone and of course I have my extended family at TYH who are all great.

I have already noticed some changes to society and the way we do things. I walk to work, and it is now very peaceful. I can even hear the birds singing now.

At TYH I feel we have really pulled together as a team. We have more time with the people whom we support. This has of course meant more work (everyone is in 24/7, no day services and 1:1 trips out at the moment). However we are all getting along and we do tons of activities: I set up an art group and we have been painting rainbows, we have film nights, beauty sessions, exercise classes, activities inside and in the garden now its sunny and I will be setting up a crafting class. So, all in all it’s a pretty happy place to be at the moment.

The people who we support have been amazing and understand things will be different and they have really chipped in. I do worry in the longer-term things may impact on their mental health but that’s what were here for after all.

We have come together as a stronger community; we support each other like a big family. People have stopped moaning (amazing I know!) but sometimes adversity brings the best out of all of us.

When this is all over, I hope we take what we have learned and use it to make things better.

I have realised that it's not the big companies who rule the world, it's us, the carers, nurses, builders, shop workers etc and without us the world would simply not function. So, everyone take care, keep going and love to you all.

Hello from Dalby View

In our family there are 8 of us who live at Dalby View, for those of you that do not know us.

Coronavirus has not been great so far but we are hopeful for the future.

We have not been able to go out, go to day services or visit our families but we are trying to make best of the situation and keep in contact through using the telephone, video calling and face timing.

We are slowly coming to terms with the situation and hope things may change very soon, so in the meantime we have all got together and decided what and how we occupy ourselves as much as we are able to. We’ve been playing bingo, spending time in the garden and watching movies. We have also nominated our own resident infection control champion (Graham!). We are all very proud of him.

We are planning to have an Easter egg hunt, make Easter bonnets and have a competition for the best decorated egg. We have compost, pots and sunflowers and lots of nice herbs that we will be planting and a member of staff’s daughter has kindly sent some quizzes for us to take part in. We have also been creating pen pictures so that we gain an extra friend to keep our spirits up.

It has been hard for staff as we have had 9 members of staff off due to various reasons, including relating to the virus. However, staff have worked extremely hard, by doing extra shifts, shopping in their own time to ensure we don’t run out of anything and they are doing their best to ensure we are happy and to make our home fun for us as they can. We appreciate this and commend them on their hard work and dedication.

Once this is all over, we will not take for granted our normal lives appreciating things we would usually take for granted like a walk to the shop or a hug from a loved one, but in the meantime we will be grateful for the support from our staff, technology keeping us connected and this lovely place that we call home.

For everyone, do not worry - this traumatic time will soon be over hopefully, and we will all go back to normal, but for now we need to stay positive and enjoy each other’s company and try our best to make a bad situation good.

We wish you all the best and stay well.

Love the Dalby family xxxx