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Members always look forward to attending Stephen’s House & Gardens. Lisa welcomed everyone and gave some updates. We had 2 new members today.

Everyone then enjoyed chatting and doing a word search puzzle and some colouring which they enjoy. Risom was not helping with the teas today as he had other garden duties. We had a lady called Christine who was very helpful.

It was then time for some chair yoga and as Richard was away today, Karen Steadman attended to cover for Richard. Everyone enjoyed the exercises with Karen and most of all enjoyed throwing the bean bags across to each other.

The session then followed with Dennis who was able to get members up and dancing straight away. His choice of music is excellent and members really enjoy listening to Dennis.

Thank you to our volunteers today – Valerie (a Trustee and Rotarian), Ian and Michael from the Rotary Club and Mark (another Trustee). Everyone was so happy today and left with a smile.

Today we went to Monmouth Street in London to visit Hotel Chocolat. We learnt how chocolate was made then we had a tasting session in the basement. After this we bought some chocolate to take home. Everyone had a great time.

https://www.hotelchocolat.com/uk/chocolate-shops/london-covent-garden.html

A small group today. It was a lovely surprise to see the room set up beautifully today by Annalisa. It was very welcoming and members arriving thought it was good change.

Lisa welcomed everyone and gave out some word search puzzles and picture puzzles for everyone to do. This kept members very busy and enjoyed chatting amongst each other.

Jalpa also popped in to welcome everyone. Lisa then introduced a new game on the table called ‘Jenga’ which is a stacking blocks game. Mark stacked the blocks into a tower and the aim for each member was to try and pull out a single block without making it all collapse. This was quite challenging but very enjoyable. One of the Copthall staff Alex who was passing saw the game and couldn’t resist as he wanted to have a go too.

Annalisa then did some exercises with everyone and made them work hard. As James Le Bec the music entertainer was sick today, Lisa then brought out 2 fluffy balls and together with Annalisa introduced some ball catching games which members had great fun.

It was then time for some music and Lisa brought out a big dice and played a ‘Name that Tune’ game and each person who got the name of the song right then rolled the dice. Members then wanted to do some singing and dancing and therefore Lisa put on the music favourites and everyone got up in a circle and danced. It was a very enjoyable session.

Thank you to Annalisa for setting up and clearing away after. Thank you also to Stella one of the new volunteers who also came today to help and of course Mark who is always ready to help in every way.

Today was as usual a very busy session and a very fun and interesting session. Lisa welcomed everyone and announced various upcoming events. She then introduced some special visitors.

Everyone welcomed Mr Martin Russell – the Queen’s representative Deputy Lieutenant of Barnet. Lisa reminded members that the last time Martin attended to visit was on the 20th April 2016. Lisa invited Martin to say few words.

Lisa then introduced Cllr David Longstaff and reminded everyone that David was the Mayor of the Borough of Barnet in May 2016/2017 and he chose Dementia Club UK as one of his charities during his Mayoral year. Lisa informed everyone further that David is the Honorary Patron of Dementia Club UK. Lisa invited David to say a few words.

Lisa then introduced Neil Aitken (General Manager Operations) and Trent Simpson (Co-founder Head of Production) from The Wayback who came to do a presentation about their product. The Wayback is Virtual Reality series, designed to help persons living with dementia connect with their carers and loved ones. Neil and Trent explained the product to everyone and then passed round a Wayback box on each table for each person to view. The film was set at the time of The Queen’s Coronation and members were able to see for example a street party during that time period. Members found it very interesting and this triggered some memories and conversations.

The web address of The Wayback is https://thewaybackvr.com/

The session then continued with Lisa reading some jokes which everyone really enjoys and then the Tovertafel was set up. Some new games have recently been installed and the game that was enjoyed the most was football as members enjoyed the challenge of scoring goals.

For the last part of the session, Lisa played some of the music favourites and this as always gets members to start singing and dancing. Everyone had such a great time and left with plenty of smiles. My thanks to my volunteers Melvyn, Dr Angela, Melissa, Marina and Mark for all their help.

Today’s session was led by Danielle and Helen, starting with colouring-in art sheets, over cups of tea, coffee and delicious cakes and biscuits organised by Mollie and June. Helen then ran two quizzes, themed food/drink and general knowledge, in which all our visitors and carers enjoyed participating, by calling out the answers. Lucille’s popular bingo then followed which members enjoyed.

Lisa then announced to members about various upcoming events one of which included the launch party of the new Dementia Club with Rotary Club of Hendon on Thursday 25th April at Hendon Town Hall, The Burroughs NW4 4AX. Lisa also announced that as the Alzheimer’s Society are no longer running their dementia cafes, Lisa has taken them over and will be running under the Dementia Club UK model – well done Lisa.

Richard then arrived to do chair yoga and decided to surprise members today by doing an alternative ‘hokey cokey’ version which meant sitting in their chairs and instead of singing ‘hokey cokey’ they would sing as ‘oh happy happy Tuesday’. It was great fun and everyone enjoyed it.

It was then time for James Le Bec to entertain us with his singing helped by his lovely assistant Joy who always helps to get everyone up and dancing. Mollie’s Charleston was most professional and in the music quiz when James gets members to throw the dice, we beat the last club by 1 point, with 112 points. There was time before the end for some games too.

The putting golf was out and the magnetic darts. One of the members Alfonso enjoyed playing several games of “Golf” He had fun counting the number of balls he got in – 6 in total. He was very happy and pleased with his score. Thanks to Suresh for washing up after tea, as well as Dr Nandini for being on hand to answer medical queries.

Thank you to Mollie, June and Lucille for their help during the session and of course thank you to Lisa and Mark for their continued support. As from the 2nd July we have decided to change the times at this venue to 2pm to 4pm so that they are in line with the other clubs.

Our monthly Dementia Club UK session was held on the 1st April at Sha’arei Tsedek Synagogue in Whetstone.

Justine welcomed everyone and informed them of future events. Our members were served tea, coffee and lovely biscuits and cake at the start of our session and were happy chatting to each other.

The fabulous Eon did some fun exercises with our members which got everyone moving!

This was followed by a fun session of entertainment provided by the very talented James LeBec. James sang a variety of popular songs to which many of the members and helpers danced. As there was a wedding anniversary to celebrate, James played a special slow dance for our 2 members Marina and Andreas who were celebrating 57 years today. Many congratulations to them. James then also did a music quiz and our members had to guess the name of the song! It was great fun! The atmosphere was fantastic!

After James left, the members continued to chat and there was also table tennis & darts for those that wanted to play! 25 members and carers attended the session with the assistance of four helpers from the synagogue who were:- Justine, Caroline, Stephen and Dot. Also thanks to Mark and Lisa the Chairman

Today’s session was led by Eugenia and Charlyn from the Rotary Club of Hendon:

Today was another thrilling day at the Dementia Club UK session at the Hendon Town Hall. Members arrived feeling the spring in the air. Refreshments were served.

Eugenia first gave a warm welcome to  everyone, Charlyn our volunteer from Rotary Club of Hendon was at hand to lead as the Bingo caller. Members, Carers and Volunteers all enjoyed the Bingo session; this was followed by an exercise session led by the enigmatic Eon who took us all through our paces.

For the first time we welcomed Dennis a seasoned musician to Dementia Club UK- Hendon Town Hall. Dennis performed different genre of music to delight members, carers and volunteers who also danced, and sang along with so much pleasure.

A special thanks goes out to volunteers from Rotary Club of Hendon, Charlyn, Eugenia, Alex and Francesca and of course our thanks to Lisa and Mark for their continued support.

A very busy session as usual. Lisa decorated the tables today with daffodils especially as Mothers Day was in a few days and informed everyone that they could take the daffodils home at the end of the session.

Lisa welcomed and thanked all the volunteers and also introduced 2 new volunteers today Angela and Rosa who received a warm welcome from everyone. Lisa also reminded everyone that Dr Angela was also in attendance to take blood pressures and provide any medical advice to members.

Lisa then introduced two visitors from Constantia Care – Morag Collier who is the Manager and Ellie Edwards who is Deputy Manager. They gave a short presentation about the type of care they provide and then there was an opportunity for members to ask questions.

It was then time for music entertainment with Moshe and as usual Moshe gets everyone up and dancing as he is able to play and sing a variety of songs in many languages. It was a fun afternoon and everyone left with a smile.

My thanks to my volunteers Dr Angela and Mark our Trustees, Lindsey, Melvyn, Melissa and of course our new volunteers.

A good attendance to today’s session. We had 25 members including some members from Friends in Need. We registered four new persons who became members of Dementia Club UK.

The session started as usual with members chatting and enjoying their teas, coffees, biscuits and cakes. Simon, our Rotary quiz master, then distributed his quiz, which consisted of 10 anagrams of famous persons. The members found the questions a bit more difficult than usual, however, they enjoyed themselves trying to find the answers.

After the quiz Richard, our yoga exercises teacher, did about 30 minutes of chair yoga exercises. Richard introduced colourful scarves to make the exercises more enjoyable. All attendees joined in and had a very enjoyable time.

The yoga session was then followed with our entertainer James Le Bec who sang songs selected by the members. James then asked the members to identify various songs and when they guessed them correctly, they were asked to throw a large dice to get points. Unfortunately, the total number of points during this session were well below other Dementia Clubs.

We also had a member’s birthday today, and all the members sang Happy Birthday. The members enjoyed listening to James’s songs and joined in singing and dancing.

Thank you to our church volunteers for making teas and coffees, setting up the venue and making the necessary preparations for the sessions; Dorothy, Sue and Andrew.

Thank you also to our Rotarians from Barnet; Jim (President), John, Victor, Malcolm and Simon. Many thanks to our Doctor Rebecca Hatjiosif for attending. Also, thanks to Mark and Lisa the Chairman of Dementia Club UK, for their continuous support making the Dementia Club at St John’s Church so successful.

Today is a special day as the 25th March celebrates Greek Independence Day. It was even more special to be able to celebrate at the Greek Britannia Centre.

The session started with a quiz which is always a good way to start a session as it gets everyone to chat together to try and get the right answers.

Joanna then arrived to do some Chi Kung exercises. Members look forward to these exercises as it helps them and teaches them how to relax and breath properly especially at stressful times.

The session then followed with our music entertainment with Ronnie. It was lovely to be able to celebrate Pamela and John’s 55 years wedding anniversary. To mark the occasion, Lisa asked Ronnie to play them their favourite song to dance to and everyone gave their best wishes. There was lots of dancing and everyone was very happy.

My thanks to my volunteers Mark who is one of the Trustees, Melissa and her husband Bob and Marina.