Our 6th July North York Seniors Centre Tour
Toronto has a great many community centres, recreation centres and senior centres. They and their volunteers do amazing work. We thought how about visiting them with some of the many people who come to Mosaic’s Community Resource Centres. To educate people, to connect people across our communities and to let people know what resources and activities there are available across the GTA.
Our first organised trip was to one of our favourite local community centres, North York Seniors Centre. We call it the Gem of North York. For over 40 years, this organization (started by seniors) has provided a great many seniors with programs and services in the Yonge/Finch area. It currently runs over 80 programs in 4 languages!!!
On Friday July 6th, Mosaic Home Care organized an outing to NYSC for a tour followed by lunch. After an initial presentation, 15 guests were given the opportunity to view a line dancing class. The music was great and 1 of our guests gave it a shot. The rest just watched… We checked out the art work done by the members hung throughout the building which were just amazing. And then we enjoyed a BBQ chicken lunch.
Because this is a public building, the cafeteria is open to the public. Many people from the office building next door stop in to pick up lunch as the lunch special (soup, salad, main course and dessert or coffee) is only $4.00!!! And Friday’s throughout the summer is BBQ day. Can’t beat this price. I took a picture just because I couldn’t believe the size of the chicken leg!
Mosaic will be organizing another tour and lunch in the winter. If this is something you are interested in, please give us a call or visit our send us an email to info@mosaichomecare.com.
For more information on North York Seniors Centre, call 416-733-4111, or visit them at www.nyseniors.org
Looking for an Active Living Centre in your area? Visit the Ontario website which lists all locations: https://www.ontario.ca/page/find-seniors-active-living-centre-near-you
We will also be looking to arrange trips to other community resources over the next year, so stay tuned as we explore the GTA’s many community resources and attractions.
Mosaic Activity Booklet – A Tour of our Wonderful City
Download here > for our July 2018 Edition and for up to date information on events in and around the GTA please go to our community twitter handle @MosaicGTALinks
A Guide for Members, Families and Caregivers
Take a tour of our wonderful city of Toronto with Mosaic’s Activity Booklet. Every month Mosaic compiles a list of festivals, shows, classes and more events that are happening in Toronto and the surrounding areas. Our Activity Booklet looks to provide the community with a number of events that are available to them every month to encourage socialization and participation in a number of fun events.
Our Activity Booklet is designed for older adults, their families, friends, personal support workers and caregivers in providing a number of options for fun outings in the community. Use our Activity Booklet to plan a fun outing with the family, or to catch your favourite artist when they are in town. With socialization being an important part to our overall health, our Activity Booklet will help people get out and provide them with options to remain social in the community. You can also find all of Mosaic’s events at our events page for both our Markham and Toronto locations, and sign-up for Mosaic’s quarterly newsletter to receive news about Mosaic and our upcoming events.
Mosaic’s commitment to lifestyle and socialization extends with our Activity Booklet. Use our activity booklet to help you discover all the wonderful events and activities that are available to you in our wonderful city of Toronto. Come back every month to find out what wonderful activities are happening in the community for you to attend!
For more up to date information on events in and around the GTA please go to our community twitter handle @MosaicGTALinks
Mosaic’s submission to the Toronto Senior’s Strategy
Regarding – EX34.2, Toronto Seniors Strategy Version 2.0
Mosaic Homecare & Community Resource Centres would like to formally extend its support to the recommendations made in Toronto Seniors Strategy Version 2.0.
Mosaic is a private homecare company with a strong history of community outreach and has been providing community resources, space, fun and educational events throughout the Greater Toronto Area for the last eight years since its incorporation. It is committed to reducing social vulnerability through community interaction, education and outreach and has a strong history of non profit community engagement and focus.
For the last eight years Mosaic has been promoting the importance of collaboration between for profit, not for profit and public sector entities in addressing the need to make our cities age friendly, inclusive and accessible and fully supports the World Health Organisation’s plans and directives for healthy aging and age friendly communities.
Addressing social vulnerability, especially the social and emotional aspects impacting isolation and loneliness shapes both our service delivery and our non profit community interaction. As an entity operating in the private sector we are one of the very few firms operating in accordance with what we believe to be the evolution of the firm with primarily for profit objectives to one that incorporates a theory of the community at its operational core. We believe that successfully implanting an age and community friendly strategy across our cities will rely on much higher levels of private, not for profit and public sector engagement.
Mosaic has received global recognition for its person centered community integrated model of care in the community and has received Gold Medal Award recognition from the European Society for Person Centered Healthcare. It has been asked to speak at a number important conferences with respect to healthy aging in the community and will be speaking at the upcoming IFA Global Conference in Toronto In August, where Jane Teasdale our business development and community relations director will also be a session chair.
We are actively developing a model of care in the community that we feel provides a blueprint for much wider public sector engagement, especially in the realms of linking the socially vulnerable older adult to meaningful engagement with their communities. We see many gaps and opportunities to link people and their communities and would recommend that age friendly initiatives look at persons in general as beings of meaning and community. Age friendly communities are essentially person friendly communities and, as such, any community friendly initiative needs to develop a multifaceted concept of personhood that all ages and cultures and communities can recognise and closely associate with. We all differ in some respects, but what unites each and every one of us is our personhood, our drive for meaning and being and our engagement with others.
With respect to the Toronto Seniors Strategy Report 2.0 we make the following comments:
CALLING ALL KNITTERS! By our roving knitting reporter Dina Campeis
MOSAIC’S first SIT & KNIT
We are excited to be a host site for the World Wide Knit in Public (WWKIP) Day on June 9th!
Let it be said right from the start that I don’t knit. It’s not that I don’t want to, it’s just that I find it difficult to count stitches and relax at the same time and that stresses me out! I did knit a baby blanket for my best friend’s first child. Thankfully, babies don’t know when a square blanket isn’t really a square and when there are dropped stitches. That was 25 years ago.
More recently, I tried to knit a dish cloth. Much easier than a blanket as there were not so many stitches to count and again, the final shape doesn’t really matter. The unfinished dish cloth is in a bag in the back of my closet where it has sat for almost two years. I only have a few rows left. I’m hoping someone will show me how to cast off when we meet for – wait for it…
MOSAIC’S first SIT & KNIT
We are excited to be a host site for the World Wide Knit in Public (WWKIP) Day on June 9th!
This is a worldwide event that started in 2005 and has grown to cover all continents! Just looking at all the 2018 knit in public locations and names is interesting. Mosaic’s Sit & Knit name pales in comparison to Newfoundland’s Purl with Pints and South Africa’s Chicks with Sticks, but I’m sure ours will be a great party!
WWKIP Day started as a way to get knitters together to meet and socialize. Knitting, like other forms of needlework and art are often done on one’s own. There are many knitters who create and donate their projects to various agencies but never have the chance to meet each other.
What a great opportunity to start a new project! Or, better yet, pull out that bag with your half-finished project and bring that with you. If you need an idea, how about knitting a square for the kittens at the local Humane Society or try a Twiddlemuff to donate to those living with dementia. Neither of these projects require a lot of skill and the recipients would be most appreciative.
Perhaps I will try one of these. Because, really, do I need another dish cloth?
If you know an older adult who used to knit or crochet and has stopped because they have no one to knit for, this would be the perfect outing for a few hours. A chance to look at what others are doing, and maybe get an idea for a new project. While we won’t have any instructors, I am confident that there will be many who will offer to ‘teach’ those who need help. A chance to learn, teach, share, enjoy and laugh. Who wouldn’t want all of this in one event?
We are inviting people of all ages and abilities to join us for a fun filled event and a chance to get to know fellow needleworkers. This event supports our belief that being active in the community contributes to staying healthy.
The Shops on Steeles and 404 has generously offered space in the mall for this indoor event. Mosaic will be providing refreshments in our Community Resource Centre and will be on hand to offer help to those looking for community information.
RSVP now to help us meet our goal of 100 knitters!
Saturday, June 9th
10:30am – 1:00pm
Shops on Steeles and 404 (2900 Steeles Avenue East)
For more information:
www.mosaichomecare.com/events/mosaics-sit-knit/
www.wwkipday.com/mosaics-sit-knit
RSVP – 905.597.7000 or info@mosaichomecare.com
Toronto Knitters Guild – a resource for yarn stores, events and programs: http://torontoknittersguild.ca
Personal Support Worker Appreciation Day – May 18th & 19th 2018 at the Mandarin Yonge & Eglinton
“Personal Support Workers are the heavy lifters of the health care system and now have a day to recognize all their hard work!” P.S.N.O. (Personal Support Network of Ontario).
Mosaic Home Care recognized our front line staff on Friday evening May 18th and Saturday May 19th, 2018. Our caregivers were invited out to a special dinner or luncheon depending on their work schedules.
This was a chance to personally catch up with our family of caregivers, to let them know how much we appreciate all their hard work and to thank them for taking to heart our person centered approach to care in the community. This was also a chance for our office staff, marketing, operations and client services to connect socially and in person.
Here are a few pictures from our two parties at the Mandarin Restaurant, Yonge & Eglinton.
It was nice to find out what our caregivers like to do on their time off and had a change to talk outside of work, about hobbies, interests and family.
Many of our caregivers provided insight on how they provide our holistic approach to person centered care and our “The Meaning of Me®” program.
One of our caregivers mentioned that one of his clients used to be a photographer so our caregiver spends time taking pictures of nature, architecture and other objects and events. When he goes to the client he shows the pictures he has taken and they both discuss some of the finer aspects of photography.
Everyone had an amazing time filled with laughter, fun, conversation and of course lots of food!!!!!
Our caregivers are looking forward to our next event; perhaps a picnic for our staff and caregivers to include our clients and families if they wish to attend.
Stay tuned……….
If any caregivers are reading this, if you are able to, please come to our Mosaic Seniors’ Month Celebration on 8th June and our Sit and Knit event on 9th of June.
Nursing Week: “Hashtags” and Social Media; Voices to Lead “Health is a Human Right”; The Impact of Funding and Staffing constraints on holistic person centered care.
International Council of Nurses: “There is no other profession that attends to people’s needs in their most vulnerable periods of time as nursing does. The relationship between the client and the nurse provides a unique and intimate view of a person’s life. “
Mosaic’s Karyn Terrell (RPN), Client Services Nurse Consultant, at a North York General Hospital Event for Nursing week.
The National theme for this year’s Nursing Week is hashtag yes this is Nursing – #YesThisIsNursing. The objective of the theme was how to “leverage social media to raise awareness, promote advocacy and connect people across the globe on important issues.” Social media is of course important and nurses can indeed use social media to raise awareness of issues to the general public. We do not however believe social media or technology itself though is the most pressing issue facing nurses at the moment. Funding pressures within healthcare at a global level is we believe poignant and important and in this respect social media provides an important avenue for carefully weighted nursing communication.
The International Council of Nurses “HEALTH IS A HUMAN RIGHT ACCESS, INVESTMENT AND ECONOMIC GROWTH” provided important definition and context to the type of communication that could be delivered through the social media medium:
North York Seniors Centre – The Gem of North York
After a long delay creating Mosaic’s latest newsletter and participating in community events, Mosaic’s Kevin Lopes has finished this blog featuring our wonderful friends at North York Seniors Centre.
Mosaic’s Jane Teasdale has always referred to North York Seniors Centre as the gem of North York for the incredible contributions the Centre makes for the older adult community in the North York area.
This past January 15th 2018, Mosaic’s Kevin Lopes was taken on a guided tour of North York Seniors Centre with Arlene de Vera including meeting with staff members Kate Kukor, Rose Gyasi, and Liza Frances to learn more about the Centre, the programs and services that are available. Kevin was also able to sit down and interview volunteer Josephine Harauz about her experience volunteering at the centre.
It was an informative day that gave Kevin insight into the incredible work, programs and services that North York Seniors Centre offers to the community. With day programs, caregiver support groups, transportation services, and a community hub at the Active Living Centre, North York Seniors Centre provides a variety of incredible services to older adults in the community. For older adults looking to be active members of their community, North York Seniors Centre is a fantastic place!
On a snowy day in January, Kevin began his day learning about some of the services that North York Senior Centre offers to the community through speaking with Kate Kukor and Rose Gyasi which include: