Activities & Entertainment

• Weekly gentle exercise classes
• Musical entertainments and concerts
• Film shows
• Visits from choirs, musicians, singers, entertainers, schools and other local groups
• Painting
• Art and crafts
• Flower arranging
• Hanging basket, pot planting and gardening
• Card making
• Games afternoons (bingo, scrabble, monopoly, ludo, card games)
• Seasonal clothing sales
• Reminiscence afternoons

Sample Monthly Activities Flyer

We have our own minibus, which is used for regular trips out – pub lunches by the river being one of the most popular outings!

Days out over the past few years have included…

• Aston Pottery
• Music Concerts at the Jacqueline du Pre Building
• Pub lunches by the river
• Concerts at local schools
• Bibury Trout Farm
• Christ Church Cathedral
• Wyevale Garden Centre
• Waterperry Gardens
• Shopping in Oxford
• Boat Trips along the Thames

Residents also enjoy gardening, pot planting and tending to raised beds and hanging baskets.

We are also very willing to try out new activities in response to suggestions from residents, and this can often open up entirely new interests for others. Recently a resident organised a life drawing class that proved to be very popular with several of our other residents!

 Artist: Gerald Phipps, Resident of St. John’s Home

 Volunteers

We have a number of wonderful volunteers who visit the Home on a regular basis, to spend time with residents, either on a one-to-one basis (helping with correspondence, reading, chatting etc) or to help out with our activities. Click here to find out what our volunteers say about us… Ordinands from Ripon College, Cuddesdon also come to undertake some of their pastoral training at the Home.

Celebrations

We celebrate residents birthdays each year with a specially made birthday cake at afternoon tea, following a sing-song by everyone at lunchtime in the Dining Room! Family and friends are welcome to come along and can use the Blue Corridor Sitting Room for a private celebration should they wish to do so. Food such as sandwiches, cakes and buffets for small functions and parties can be provided by our catering staff – for a small charge. Our most famous birthday celebration was for a resident’s 106th birthday – and we are more than happy to have this record broken!

Events

Every summer we hold an annual “get-together”, providing a very pleasant excuse to invite friends and relatives to join us, to put faces to names and to catch up with the latest news. Over the years these occasions have been a wonderful opportunity for everyone to renew old friendships and to make new ones. For the last few years we have held a barbeque in the grounds which always proves very popular.

St. John’s Day – 27th December – is a very important day for us, when we hold our annual festive tea. Residents, relatives and friends of the Home are invited to join us in the celebrations, when we are usually packed to the rafters with friends enjoying our tasty food and warm hospitality!