Our stories

Peace of mind

Moving into a care home made easy

Our care team are here to make sure that making the move is as easy as possible for you and your loved one. If you still need reassurance, here are some stories from our residents, their families and our care team.

October arrived and with it the build up to Halloween with a variety of light hearted and enjoyable activities. The residents took part in decorating Halloween bunting with a variety of mediums including pens, pencils, tissue paper, oil pastels and chalk pastels.

Happy Halloween

Turns out, pumpkin carving can be quite hard work! So the residents did the seeds, then let Della do all the hard work before they got creative

Our residents all doing their pumpkins for Halloween. All displayed in their windows in their lounges.

All enjoyed coffee and biscuits whilst taking part.

We had a great time for Halloween, and how great do the decorations look! We listened to some spooky songs, played some Halloween picture bingo and took some silly selfies! We all had a lot of fun and can't wait until next year!

We tried something a bit different today, and made some keyrings! They look absolutely fabulous and everyone was very pleased with them! They stop keys getting mixed up as well as adding some colour!

We were delighted to take part in the Newton Aycliffe pumpkin trail this year for all of the children who won’t get to go trick or treating. We decorated all of the windows in the home in the home that the children passing would give us a wave as they went by on Halloween.

Newton Aycliffe pumpkin trail

We had a wonderful morning doing our arm chair exercises at Rose Lodge and even took a little video of us having a bit of fun doing the YMCA dance with Diane, one of our activity coordinators and one of our care staff, Leanne. Imagine how delighted we were to hear that over 8,000

Dancing up a storm at Rose Lodge

We feel like lockdown has created some master bakers at Barnes Court.

Master Bakers at Barnes Court

There has been a lot of Halloween activity at Barnes Court in October. We have enjoyed baking spooky ghost biscuits, dressing up and having our faces painted for the Halloween party and enjoying some delicious treats which were donated by out local Family Shopper. Thank you so much.

Halloween at Barnes Court

We had a try at making our own flower arrangements at the home in October to brighten up the home with Autumn themes. We used blocks of oasis to hold the flowers in place in a vase and then added roses and greenery to the display. We were really happy with the results and Stacey, our

Flower Making at Home

Many of our residents at Garden Hill used to be a dab hand in the kitchen. Activities have changed quite a bit since lockdown but one of the residents favourite activities is home baking and they decided to make their own apple cake. They mixed the ingredients for the base, chopp

An Apple a Day keeps the Doctor Away

Food is an important aspect of any home and here at Field View your choice of breakfast is always served every morning whether it be a full breakfast, cereal or even kippers.

Breakfast at Field View

We are firm believers that charity begins at home and at Field View this is the ethos we live by. On 23rd October residents and staff dressed in pink and donated money to Breast Cancer Awareness and raised £200 for charity. The residents had a lovely day wearing pink and enjoying pink

Tickled Pink at Field View

We had some fantastic celebrations over the Halloween weekend. We started with a Halloween party on Friday and had a lovely time playing pass the parcel, pin the tail on the cat, apple bobbing and then the staff entertained us with Time Warp dance. We had a good sing and dance an

Halloween at Field View

We had lots of Birthdays at Earsdon in October including Millie who is celebrating her 88th birthday with plenty of cake with her friends in the home.

October Birthdays

Meet Andrea, one of our fantastic domestic team at Earsdon Grange, who has been busy today getting one of our bedrooms ready for a new resident coming into their new home.

We hope you enjoy many years in your new home.

We had a fun time at Belmont House on 25th September for the Macmillan Worlds Biggest Coffee morning and raised £105.50 for Macmillan Cancer Research this year. We had a chocolate hamper, some raffles and enjoyed cake and tea.

Macmillan Coffee Morning

This month the residents of Willow Bank enjoyed making decorations for Halloween. The residents made spiders and bats. We also did pumpkin carving and made milk bottle lanterns by decorating milk bottles and filling them with water and glow sticks. Lots of fun had by all.

Pumpkin Carving at Willow Bank

The residents at The Belvedere had a great day celebrating Halloween. We had a good laugh dressing up, painting pumpkins and decorating cupcakes. The residents finished the day off enjoying their decorated cupcakes with a cup of coffee and a movie.

Halloween at The Belvedere

We had fun making and displaying our Halloween goodies. On each floor the display was different but effective, along with a Halloween karaoke, and finding scary movies to watch...spooky time!

Halloween at Clarendon

Halloween celebrations at Heeley Bank, everyone enjoyed dressing up.

Halloween at Heeley

Halloween week ended at Heeley Bank with a big Halloween party! With games, sweets and great music everyone had so much fun. Two very lucky residents got to be covered in toilet paper to become living mummy's.

Halloween Party

Staff at Croft House Care Home got dressed up for Halloween. The residents loved seeing all the outfits and it filled the home with laughter and good smiles.

Halloween at Croft House

A great session of movement to music with pom-poms and scarves followed by a lovely time together discussing the joy of babies as we held the therapy dolls and took care of them.

Movement to Music

We had so much fun at our Halloween Party. The residents made their own face mask which they wore with pride. They also made cobweb cupcakes which everyone thoroughly enjoyed. We danced along to Monster Mash and enjoyed party games and a buffet. We all had a spooktacular time!

Halloween Party

A wonderful morning of activities at The Westbourne as residents enjoyed spending time together. Music, therapy dolls and lots of smiles and conversation made this morning of friendship and fun for everyone.

We had a lot of fun at Rose Lodge Care Home in Newton Aycliffe for Halloween with residents and staff getting dressed up, a buffet of fabulous Halloween cakes and our very own version of Time Warp.

Halloween comes to Rose Lodge

Cavendish Court are proud to announce the implementation of our new concept "The Window of opportunity".

Window Of Opportunity

We held a Wear It Pink day to raise money for breast cancer. All of the residents and staff wore pink clothes and pink ribbons and enjoyed music, cake, sweets, treats and dancing.

Wear It Pink Day

We made Halloween lanterns and the residents loved the noses lighting up!

The residents love our Halloween wall. They enjoy looking at and talking about the Halloween images from around the world.

Halloween at Bowerfield House

Many of our residents here at Cavendish Court have missed the little joys in life during the past several months, where even the option to go for a drink at the local pub had become a distant memory.

Cavendish Court's Pub

We have been continuing our Bowerfield Olympics theme and there have been more competitions throughout the week. We had a cake decorating competition, a ball throwing competition, a ring toss competition and much more! Team Red is currently winning against team blue by 1 point.

Bowerfield Olympics

Our residents had a traditional English tea party with lots of lovely cakes and scones to choose from. We started the afternoon with tea and coffee followed by a glass of fizz with strawberries to celebrate the weekend. A great afternoon enjoyed by all.

Our residents at Heeley Bank, as always, really enjoyed the flower arranging session. They created beautiful bouquets which we have displayed on the dining room tables.

Flower Arranging

At Heeley Bank our residents and staff baked their heart out and had a lovely time at the Macmillan coffee morning.

Macmillan Coffee Morning

At Heeley Bank our residents made their own home made pizzas which everyone really enjoyed.

This week we spiced up our life with some Bollywood fun. Our residents tucked into a starter of Poppadoms served with mint yoghurt or mango chutney, Bombay mix and garlic naan bread.

Carmel Lodge Indian Meal

This week we brought a Spanish flavour to Carmel Lodge with our "viva la fiesta" afternoon. We were blessed with beautiful weather which meant we could eat al fresco. Our residents enjoyed a selection of tapas including, hot and cold meals, cheeses and seafood.

Spanish Afternoon

This week at Carmel Lodge we carved pumpkins, decorated gingerbread coffins and today we had our monster mash ball. We enjoyed a feast with lots of Halloween themed food and a tipple of cauldron juice.

Halloween at Carmel

This week we have been playing games, the winners were given silly hats to wear all day. Here are some of the winners and their lucky prizes.

Heeley Bank's Silly Hats

The district nurses came to Howgate today to give our residents their annual Flu vaccinations, they said it was a lovely home and thanked the staff for all their help.

Flu Vaccination

Residents at The Westbourne continue to enjoy the theme of Italy with an array of Italian food to sample. The chef served a taste of Italy in true style in the dining room and was happy to lend his Italian chef hat to diners for the day. A great celebration of Italian food.

Italian Food At The Westbourne

Throughout the month we have had Olympic activities. Our home has been split into 2 teams, a red team and a blue team. All staff on shift tomorrow for the party have been told which team they will be competing on and are going to be dressed up in their team colours.

Bowerfield Court Olympics

We did Bowerfield Olympics. We had a red and a blue team, residents and staff went against each other in a number of activities. Everyone had so much fun. We enjoyed a buffet party, and celebrated a number of birthdays including a staff member turning 21.

Bowerfield Olympics

The Residents enjoyed taking part in making autumn wreaths and decorations for the Home.

We chatted about the colours of autumn, read poems about the season and traditions from around the world.

Making Autumn Wreaths

Abingdon Court are celebrating after being rated Good in all areas during a recent CQC inspection. As well as thanking the staff for their hard work we want to thank the residents, their friends and families and the local community who continue to support us.

Rated Good in all areas by CQC

People living at Croft House Care Home have had a busy month making poppy and pumpkin wreaths. They look fantastic and are displayed around the home.

Poppy and Pumpkin Wreaths at Croft House

We started this with some of our residents at Croft House as just a creative session for the family visits to raise a bit of money for the Royal British Legion. It has taken off so well and we are close to raising £70 so far and still got orders coming, we all feel so proud.

Raising Money for Royal British Legion

The residents at Allingham House enjoyed last week, doing different artistic activities where they let their imagination run free.

Halloween Decorations at Allingham House

The residents at Allingham House enjoyed last week, doing different artistic activities where they let their imagination run free.

Halloween Decorations at Allingham House