Christmas'ness

Christmas'ness

I didn't hear from my favorite  COTA, my daughter Tawnia.    Perhaps she worked late after the holiday, 
or maybe her patients were naughty-not nice,  and she didn't want to complain.
"Yes,"  she explained.  "People were naughty today."
Were they cookied out? I wondered.
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Christmas blessings and restings

                                       

Book entitled "A Little Child"
by Jessie Orton Jones and Elizabeth Orton Jones

Older Ornaments

Christmas Eve and a stop at the community thrift shop.   Ten minutes before closing.   A harried week.  The end of clinicals in a skilled facility.  Tawnia needed a change of focus - from care giving to festivity.  A string of lights.  Maybe a tree.  Yes, there it was, a little plastic evergreen.  Oh, and she spotted a basket of ornaments that were a little picked over.  None were new, or vintage and collectible,  but nevertheless, each was unique, and each only 25 cents.    She took pause and  took them all.  

As she hung each one on artificial boughs, they reminded her of the residents at the care center, and of their personalities ~ the angel, the bear,  and the  puppy on a sleigh.  

With a bit of Christmas light,  they came to life and with purpose.  They brightened her night.

Deuteronomy 32: 2 "As the small rain upon the tender herb..."

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Untangling the Christmas Lights

Posted from PeachyCritters.blogspot.com   DM 
 Elderly play and care at: hollyhockjunction

Paper Dolls in a skilled facility.

Inside the door of Room 204,  lives Myrna, who is in the  xyz's of her life.  She needs help with her hands- fine motor skills and strengthening exercises.  I don't know the terms, or  the OT tools needed. Pennies to push into clay?  But today,  she's given a scissors, and  she cuts giant paper dolls with great enthusiasm.   A lady who   explains that she always loved arts and crafts.  (Vintage paper dolls can be found on Ebay.)
 Deuteronomy 32: 2   "small rain upon the tender herb...".  A small rain. 
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Physical Therapists on Youtube!

Occupational  Therapy is celebrating it's 100th year.  (1917 - 2017) 
Daughter Tara COTA recently got her degree as an  Occupational Therapy Assistant- and is  trying to help people get back their confidence and strength,  using proven medical exercises and techniques...

...a father, a carpenter, the bread winner with four school age children, had a stroke and wants to get back to work...it takes  more than two visits!   But he has run out of his allotted insurance time, so the COTA suggested to the patient’s teenage son who wanted to help his father get back on his feet,  "that he go on Youtube and look up some helpful exercises".   

Take a look!

"Physicaltherapyvideo" - Famous Physical Therapists.  Two Brothers Bob Schrupp and Brad Heineck. 

Deuteronomy 32:2 "small rain upon the tender herb."  
  
Elderly play and care at Hollyhockjunction

   

How Shall I Press On?

Niagra Spray Starch, Original.  That's what I've  always used to add starch to my ironing, and right now I can't find it on the shelves. The grocery store has been out of it for several weeks. It's  not  in the nearby box stores,  big or little grocery stores, or  hardware stores, in any direction. Niagra.press on. It's been around for over a century. 
Call me old fashioned, I like it,   prefer it, and have used it for many years- it doesn't stick to the bottom of my iron and turn it brown. 

What happened to it?  I go on line and look:  Amazon.com sells four in a pack. Need I say more? It's a new day, but I don't want to have to go on line to buy a can of spray starch. 

Deuteronomy 32:2 "small rain upon the tender herb."   

Young and old connecting.

Health issues, yes, yes, yes.  Irma Hurricane,  85 years strong and living up to  that hurricane's name, has  found herself at early morning exercise class  for people with a little age on them.  The  class is  coached by her young grandson,  a sports therapy major.  She's getting out the kinks, ridding herself of the pain in her back, stepping it up a bit, on exercise machines.

Deuteronomy 32:2 "small rain upon the tender herb."  Elderly play and care at hollyhockjunction

Pumpkin patch.

Proverbs 31:14 KJ "She is like the merchant ships, she bringeth her  food from afar." 

Maybe not from so far away today,  but from a nearby vegetable stand at the edge of a farmer's garden.

The green pumpkin in the photo is a new variety. It's  green in color,  but  it's ripe.  (Exotic are  the spices for the pumpkin pie -ginger, nutmeg, and cloves.)

At  the community pumpkin patch. DM

 Little Girl With Stand-uppy Hair 

(On my other blog, Validations.blogspot.com)

Deuteronomy 32:2 "small rain upon the tender herb"  A small rain.  

Weekly columns in small town newspapers- good news

In a care center where a family member resides,   library hour is held  and several weekly columns  are read out loud from the local  newspaper.   They are a great way for the old timers to connect- and for helpers and family to connect. 

Proverbs 15:30 "Light in a messenger's eyes brings joy to the heart, and good news gives health to the bones...Bright eyes gladden the heart, good news puts fat on the bones."  


Barb, a longtime friend, recently sent clippings from her local newspaper  called,  From the Attic,  by Myra.
    
The author writes about the past - the things that the elderly remember and can relate to:  When the wash hung out on the line in winter and freeze dried.  When her grandfather's farm sold,  her parents house sold, and  their country church closed. (The church where she was married, confirmed and baptized.)  Myra  remembered playing in the hay mow,  wading in the river, playing in the ice house,  reading books  in her favorite cozy corner, and  the Christmas programs..."

In a second article she wrote about current events ,the contrasts, and making a connection:  "I'd never heard of FM radios, computers, yogurt, or guys wearing earrings.  I listened to Big Bands, Jack Benny and the President's speeches on radio. 

The news paper articles give caregivers  opportunity  to relay, relate, connect and interact with their care receivers.    

Deuteronomy 32:2 "small rain upon the tender herb".  Elderly play and care at hollyhockjunction

October on the Prairie

Genesis 8:22 "As long as the earth endures - seed time and harvest..."

 

Deuteronomy 32: 2 "small rain upon the tender herb."  Elderly play and care at hollyhockjunction

Autumn Butterflies

Not a Monarch- smaller.  
Not a white or yellow cabbage butterfly landing on the milkweed pods-  I think those are gone.
But Painted Ladies,  here on flowers in autumn. 

Psalms 24:1  The earth is the Lord's and the fullness of it, 

the world and they who dwell in it.  

Deuteronomy 32:2 "small rain upon the tender herb".  
 Elderly play and care at:  hollyhockjunction

Ask an old timer-chickens were once a part of everyday life.

 Ask AN OLD TIMER if  CHICKENS WERE ONCE A PART OF EVERYDAY LIFE.  

Neighborhood Patching Parties:
The ladies got together to do their mending, and to catch up with the news.  None had telephones.
Also, they held poultry parties to dress the chickens...Draw, scald, and pluck! A job they didn't mind having help with!  

 

Deuteronomy 32:2 "small rain upon the tender herb".  
Elderly play and care at:  hollyhockjunction

Calico prints are back.

Deuteronomy 32:2  "small rain upon the tender herb." 
Elderly play and care at hollyhockjunction

Proverbs woman a queen: I try to relate.

Salt Box House embroidered.

QUEEN OF SODA CRACKERS and cheese...CRUMBS AND ALL. (Her little muncher is the sweetest.) 
  
  My daughter lives in a little red saltbox house big enough for a husband, a child, and a dog.  
  I heard her tell her daughter once,   "Missy,  I'm the queen around here."
 Her young daughter,  a girl with 
stand-uppy hair, raised her  eyebrows and said,  "And Mom,  you're doing a good job,too."

Proverbs 31: 28 "Her  children rise up and call her blessed...".



The Proverbs woman a queen: I try to relate.  Her husband is at the city's gates.  Her children are learning beside her.  She assigns her maids their tasks. (My maids are prayers.) 
She is a  daughter.  Are her parents elderly?  Her sisters in Christ, where are they? ("Her lamp goes not out..." And what do the neighbors think?  ("Let the fruit of her own hands praise her in the gates of the city.")  XYZinnia

Deuteronomy 32:2  "small rain upon the tender herb". 
Elderly free play and care at hollyhockjunction

Octoberfest

Deuteronomy 32:2 "small rain upon the tender herb."   hollyhockjunction

Owls

Owl spotted.  Spotted Owl.  

Early this morning, the hymns.

Proverbs 31: 18 (Amplified Bible)   "...her lamp goes not out; but it burns on continually through the night (of trouble, privation or sorrow, warning away fear, doubt and distrust).  

Light on the Prairie
Six o'clock in the morning and some of the residents are very much awake.

Anna is still in bed and her whole body aches.  It's the  rheumatism.   The helper fluffs her pillow, and tucks warm hot packs  around her shoulders.  Together they watch the sun come up and the sky turn pink.  Anna smiles and requests they sing an old hymn.

Robert is diabetic, an amputee, and there's no sign his other foot is healing. He's sitting in his wheelchair eager to have the helper come with his first  cup of morning coffee.  (Breakfast coffee isn't served until eight. He’s up at six so that’s a little too late.))  Robert is  in his seventies, and his arms are strong and his mind is sharp.   This morning he recalls an old hymn and names the fifties artist who sang it.  He asks, "Would you be able to find it on your Iphone?  "How Great Thou Art."   When it's found,   they sing along.  (Several days earlier he recalled the song,  Mississippi Squirrel by Robert Stevens-. "The squirrel in church!"   He said with a laugh. " That song makes me want to go back to church."

Jacob, in his nineties,  this morning,  is discouraged.  He wants to go home.  His room and his privacy don't feel like his own.  And he isn't wanting to do any exercises today.  The helper asks if he would like to sing the old hymns. As  they sing, the words come back to him.  The helper rhythmically taps her feet, and Jacob follows.  His face brightens and they clap hands to the music.
(Exercise blessed.)   
When the helper is ready to leave the room, she smiles back at him , and  bids him to have a good day, and she means it.

Early this morning, the hymns. 

Deuteronomy 32:2  "small rain upon the tender herb."   Hollyhockjunction

GREETINGS CARDS

"I am rich.  I have a dock,
 a  fishing pole, and a worm to put on my hook".  Maggie

GREETINGS FROM MAGGIE
  In summer heat, and through unshoveled snow,  my neighbor Maggie walks down the road to her rural mailbox where she picks up the latest news.  She also sends off greeting cards and letters to the people that she knows.
  She's almost ninety and lives alone, and not only does she fish, but she does the bunny hop with her great grandchildren.
  The children ask,  "Grandma, why are you living so long?  
  I tell them,  "God wants me here to pray for you kids!"

  Maggie tells me she knows a person who is afraid her wisdom will perish when she is gone. 
  I smile.  I like the stories Maggie  tells as we sit and  enjoy the lake.  She has raised twelves children and has insights to pass on.
                                                                                               "I'm that person,"  she further                                                                                                   explains-  "Looney me!"

                                                                                             "Looney me, too,"  I say.                                                                                                   

                           

                                                                                    

Proverbs 2:8-10 KJ  He keepth the paths of judgment, and preserveth the way of his saints.  Then shalt though understand righteousness, and judgment, and equity, yea, every good path.  

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Looney Me

Deuteronomy 32:2 : "small rain upon the tender herb."  hollyhockjunction