The beginning of a new year is the perfect time to reflect on the wonderful experiences that bring the residents, families and team members together in each of the Schlegel Villages. Through The Village Voice, a small fraction of these experiences is shared, but the surface is barely scratched. Still, upon reflection 2023 brought us many stories of growth in both our Villages and our relationships, and we wanted to share a few of them to kick off 2024.
In the spring we saw the long-awaited opening of the new long-term care neighbourhoods in The Village of Winston Park, where team members and residents from Waterloo’s Pinehaven Nursing Home moved to create a larger Winston Park community. Ursula and her husband, George, were among those who made the move, and the story of how they quickly created a true home was one of our most widely read in 2023.
We also saw the opening of our new retirement neighbourhoods in the Village of Glendale Crossing in London this fall. As each day passes into the early days of 2024, new residents move in to expand the family there. We shared the story of Dorothy and Bruce here, the first residents to walk over the new threshold on opening day.
If the residents who choose to call a Schlegel Village home are the heart of Village life, the team members who serve them are the pulse. For many residents, these team members are their only family and it is in each unique relationship that that values of the organization thrive. We cherish our diversity at Schlegel Villages, and our small home in Mississauga, Erin Mills Lodge, was one of many to celebrate the beauty of global connections combining within one family. See the story here.
We’ve also welcomed several internationally-education nurses (IEN) into our Villages to be part of our teams as they create new lives in Canada. In each case, their new Village families have been eager to support them every step of the way, as we see in Michael and Michelle’s story here. If you are an IEN considering your own path to life in Canada, we have more information here.
The year ahead will bring many more exciting events and stories; we’re working hard to move construction forward on several new long-term care Villages in the months to come, for example, beginning in Stouffville, Milton, Ajax and Ottawa. When one believes in the power of a social model of living for all residents that encourages them to live life to the fullest, no matter their age or ability, then one must strive to spread that mission to more communities, and we’re proud to be able to do that.
As we think of that mission, we think of the residents from The Village of Riverside Glen in Guelph who inspired us to reconsider what is possible at an age where most people wrongly assume the zest for life has faded. Sandra Luebbecke and her 10,000-foot skydiving adventure is but one of the many stories from Riverside Glen of residents pushing beyond conventional expectation, and in each of their examples, we see what it means to make the most of each and every day.
Happy New Year!
