Wreath of leaves- an easy to do fall craft for those with dementia

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Wreath of leaves- an easy to do fall craft for those with dementia

Supplies needed:

A plain white paper plate
Construction paper (orange, red, yellow, brown, and other earth tones)
Crayons or markers
Scissors
Glue or a glue stick

Cut a half circle out of the center of a plain paper plate. This will hold the leaves.

Cut out a lot of leaves from construction paper. Draw the leaf veins if you wish. If you'd like, use leaves gathered from outdoors.

Leaf templates and other fall ideas

Glue the leaves all around the rim of the paper plate.

For more, come back soon

Leaf Wreath- An Easy Dementia Activity(part 2)

Activities directors, caregivers, and healthcare professionals,here is some great information

Here is a great dementia resource for caregivers and healthcare professinals,

Here is information on being the best caregiver you can be

Get your subscription to Activity Director Today's e magazine

In the lower center of the wreath, write, "I am thankful for," and then let the client write or draw what he is thankful for.
Put the client's name on the wreath (or let him sign it).

For variations on this wreath: instead of using cut out leaves, use leaves from outdoor trees, silk leaves or torn-up scraps of paper.

Tree Names

Activities directors, caregivers, and healthcare professionals,here is some great information

Here is a great dementia resource for caregivers and healthcare professinals,

Here is information on being the best caregiver you can be

American Arborvitae
American Beech
American Elm
American Yellowwood
Amur Maple
Ann Magnolia
Aristocrat Flowering Pear
Austrian Pine
Autumn Blaze Red Maple
Autumn Flame Red Maple
Autumn Olive
Autumn Purple Ash
Bald Cypress
Bitternut Hickory
Black Cherry
Black Gum
Black Hills Spruce
Black Locust
Black Oak
Black Walnut
Black Willow
Bloodgood London Planetree
Blue Spruce
Box elder
Bradford Flowering Pear
Bur Oak
Butterfly Bush
Canada Red Cherry
Cedar Elm
Chanticleer Flowering Pear
Cherokee Chief Red
Flowering Dogwood
Cherokee Princess White
Flowering Dogwood
Cherokee Sweetgum Tree
Cherry Bark Oak
Chestnut Oak
Chickasaw Plum
Chinese Chestnut
Chinese Elm
Chinese Pistache
Chinkapin Oak
Cimarron Ash
Cleveland Select Flowering Pear
Colorado Blue Spruce
Columnar English Oak
Common Purple Lilac
Contorted Willow
Dawn Redwood
Dura-Heat River Birch
Dwarf Red Buckeye
Eastern Red Cedar
Eastern Red Oak
Eastern Redbud
Eastern White Pine
European Horse Chestnut
Forest Pansy
Fragrant Honeysuckle
Fraser Fir
Fringe Tree
Gobbler Sawtooth Oak
Golden Chain Tree
Golden Raintree
Green Ash
Hackberry
Hardy Pecan
Heritage River Birch
Hybrid Willow
Ironwood Tree
Ivory Silk Lilac Tree
Jane Magnolia
Kentucky Coffee Tree
Kousa Dogwood
Kwanzan Flowering Cherry
Lacebark Elm
Loblolly Pine
Lombardy Poplar
Maidenhair
Mayhaw
Mimosa Tree
Mockernut Hickery Native Plum
Northern Catalpa
Northern Red Oak
Norway Spruce
Nuttail Oak
October Glory Red Maple
Ohio Buckeye
Okame Flowering Cherry
Oklahoma Redbud
Osage Orange
Overcup Oak
Patmore Ash
Paw Paw
Persimmon
Pignut Hickory
Pin Oak
Pink Flowering Dogwood
Pond Cypress
Ponderosa Pine
Poplar Hybrid
Post Oak
Prairiefire Crabapple
Red Bud
Red Cedar
Red Maple
Red Sunset Red Maple
Redspire Flowering Pear
River Birch
Russian Olive
Sargent Crabapple
Sassafras Tree
Sawtooth Oak
Scarlet Oak
Scotch Pine
Serviceberry
Shademaster Honey Locust
Shagbark Hickory
Shellbark Hickory
Shumard Oak
Siberian Elm
Silver Maple
Silverbells
Siouxland Cottonless Cottonwood
Snow Goose Flowering Cherry
Sourgum
Sourwood
Southern Crabapple
Southern Red Oak
Sugar Maple
Sugarberry
Sunburst Golden Honey Locust
Swamp Chestnut
Swamp Oak
Sweet Gum
Sweetbay or Swamp Magnolia
Sycamore
Texana Nuttail Oak
Texas Whitebud
Thornless Honeylocust
Tulip Poplar
Tulip Tree
Tupelo
Virginia Pine
Washington Hawthorne
Water Oak
Weeping Higan Cherry
Weeping Willow
White Ash
White Flowering Dogwood
White Oak
White Pine
White Walnut
Whitebud
Willow Oak
Yellow Buckeye
Yoshino Cherry
Zumi Crabtree

Prayers lift spirits

Activities directors and other healthcare professionals here is a great dementia resource for caregivers and healthcare professinals.Benevolant Society

Here is information on being the best caregiver you can be

Here is a way for nurses administrators, social workers and other health care  professionals to get an easyceu or two


Beyond Blue

The Serenity Prayer by Reinhold Niebuhr
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right if I surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him Forever in the next.
Amen.

Prayer by Thomas Merton
My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this
you will lead me by the right road
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always
though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.


The Third Step Prayer
God, I offer myself to Thee …
to build with me and to do with me as Thou wilt.
Relieve me of the bondage of self,
that I may better do Thy will.
Take away my difficulties,
that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help
of Thy Power, Thy Love, and Thy Way of life.
May I do Thy will always!

The Memorare
Remember O Most gracious Virgin Mary,
that never was it known that anyone who fled to your protection,
implored your help,
or sought your intercession
was left unaided.
Inspired by this confidence,
I fly to you, O Virgin of virgins, my mother.
To you I come;
before you I stand, sinful and sorrowful.
O Mother of the Word Incarnate,
despise not my petitions,
but in your mercy, hear and answer me.
Amen.

Prayer by John Henry Newman
Dear Jesus,
Help me to spread Your fragrance everywhere I go.
Flood my soul with Your spirit and life.
Penetrate and possess my whole being so utterly,
that my life may only be a radiance of Yours.
Shine through me, and be so in me
that every soul I come in contact with may feel Your presence in my soul.
Let them look up and see no longer me,
but only Jesus!
Stay with me and then I shall begin to shine as you shine,
so to shine as to be a light to others;
the light, O Jesus will be all from You;
none of it will be mine;
it will be you, shining on others through me.
Let me thus praise You the way You love best,
by shining on those around me.
Let me preach You without preaching,
not by words but by my example,
by the catching force of the sympathetic influence of what I do,
the evident fullness of the love my heart bears to You.
Amen.
St. Teresa of Avila’s “Bookmark”
Let nothing disturb you.
Let nothing frighten you.
All things are passing.
God alone is changeless
He who has patience wants for nothing
He who has God has all things.
God alone suffices.

Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury,pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek?to be consoled as to console;?to be understood as to understand;?to be loved as to love.?For it is in giving that we receive;?it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;?and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen
image courtesy of wikipedia

More about craft projects for those with dementia

Activities directors, other healthcare professionals and caregivers, we have been discussing a patriotic craft for the Fourth of July. Here is more information.

The above craft can be done for any patriotic activity simply by changing the words or not having any words at all.

Make sure when you do a project that each step is simple

Do a project over a number of days so people do not lose interest during the activity.

If you are doing it in one day, then take breaks and do trivia or singing in between steps

Have a volunteer complete most of the project and have group members complete the project

For a great resource for those with dementia, caregivers and healthcare professionals, 

Easy patriotic art for those with dementia

Activities directors, other healthcare professionals and caregivers, there are so many crafts for the Fourth of July or for any other patriotic holidays.

Here is a great dementia resource for caregivers and healthcare professinals,

Here is information on being the best caregiver you can be


One in particular that I like is a wall hanging

You will need:
1/2 half sheet of blue construction paper
red and white crepe paper streamers
glue or tape

Give each participant or team 1/2 sheet of blue construction paper
Also give them about 8 inches of red and 6 inches of white crepe paper.
Have them cut or rip them into a[[roximately 2 inch pieces so they have 7 pieces of about the same size
Have them glue or tape the crepe paper to the blue construction paper on the horizontal edge, alternating colors with 4 red strips and 3 white strips
The side they glue the strips to, is the back
Let the glue dry
This is a good time to sing some patriotic songs or play patriotic trivia

When they are almost dry or dry,decorate the front with star sticker, white stickers, or you can have them glue a smaller sign on the front that says
Happy 4th of July

They can put a ribbon across the top so they can display their hanging

Declaration of Independence

Activities directors, caregivers, and healthcare professionals,here is some great information

Here is a great dementia resource for caregivers and healthcare professionals,

Here is information on being the best caregiver you can be

Get your subscription to Activity Director Today's e magazine

Kids celebrate America

Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies

In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained, and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

• For protecting them by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
• For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
• For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
• For depriving us in many cases of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
• For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
• For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
• For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
• For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms. Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren.

• We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us.
• We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here.
• We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence.

They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by the authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare.
That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown,
and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is and ought to be totally dissolved;
and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce,
and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

The signers of the Declaration represented the new States as follows:

New Hampshire:

Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton

Massachusetts:

John Hancock, Samual Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry

Rhode Island:

Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery

Connecticut:

Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott

New York:

William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris

New Jersey:

Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark

Pennsylvania:

Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross

Delaware:

Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean

Maryland:

Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia:

George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton

North Carolina:

William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn

South Carolina:

Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton

Georgia:

Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton