Rockdale House Care Home Open Afternoon, Friday 28th June 2019
News
Keep up to date with all the latest news from Rockdale
Bringing generations together
14th May 2019
We enjoy the relationship with our local nursery and preschool very much. We all love hearing the excited chattering as the little ones arrive with their minders.
Our residents in Rockdale House, our Residential Care Home, happily enjoy regular visits from the children.
Last week the children attended to help plant the beds around our new Summer House with the sunflowers they started off a little while ago. They also planted up a wheelbarrow with vegetables, carrying on with our edible plants theme! It will be very exciting to watch the growth of these new plantings and lovely for the children to come and harvest their crop later on.
Bringing our generations together is very important to us all.
Would you like to receive a copy of our News & Views magazine?
10th May 2019
Would you like to receive a copy of our free News & Views magazine?
As a valued supporter of Rockdale, we would like to keep you up to date with our news.
Due to the changes in Data Protection legislation, which came into effect a year ago, we need your permission to send you a copy of our News & Views magazine.
If you used to receive a copy of News & Views and you are no longer receiving it, but would like to, please call or email Marian on 01732 458762 / marian.wright@rockdale.org.uk.
Your personal details will be held securely on our server, in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulations, and will never be shared with third parties.
Link to our privacy notice: https://www.rockdale.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/rh_privacy_policy.pdf
My life is magic!
9th May 2019
One of our residents is a member of the Inner Magic Circle with Gold Star and recently gave a talk and performed magic to other residents here at Rockdale.
The Magic Circle is the premier magical society in the fascinating world of magic and illusion, with an international membership of around 1500, all dedicated to promoting and advancing the art of magic.
A wonderful and memorable magic moment for us!
Rockdale residents celebrate the opening of their new Summer House
2nd May 2019
Today, we celebrated the completion of our beautiful new Summer House. Keen gardener, Roy, cut the ribbon and declared the Summer House officially open for residents to use.
Our fabulous gardening team and ‘Mrs G’ have worked extremely hard to deliver this project and it looks fantastic. Our residents will enjoy this area very much during the Summer months.
The Summer House funding was very kindly donated by the Sevenoaks Round Table and First Title Insurance. Thank you so much, it is a very special addition to Rockdale and we look forward to inviting you here very soon.
Rockdale’s Open Afternoon, Monday 10th June 2019
Planting at Rockdale
18th April 2019
We have many keen gardeners living here at Rockdale 🙂
Today, our Head Gardener, Annette, and resident, ‘Mrs G’ have been planting edible plants and summer flowers around our new Summer House.
Have you heard of a Gojiberry? One of natures best-kept secrets, apparently! Originating in the Himalayan highlands, a powerful nutritional and anti-aging food. They contain more vitamin C than an orange and rich in anti-oxidants. We look forward to eating some of those!
Eliza Ruffle, talented young pianist, plays for our residents
4rh April 2019
We were delighted when the extremely talented young pianist, Eliza Ruffle joined us at Rockdale yesterday afternoon to perform to our residents.
Eliza performed and introduced six pieces of beautiful and emotive music, including Rachmaninov G# Minor Prelude and Chopin Revolutionary Etude No 12 Op 10, both in Rockdale House Care home and the Beatrice Wilson Common Room.
Thank you, Eliza, for making our afternoon here at Rockdale extra special.
A beautiful welcome
20th March 2019
Our stunning magnolia tree is currently the crowning glory greeting you as you arrive through the entrance to Rockdale. A beautiful welcome.
Our lovely Summer House
27th March 2019
The Summer House now sits proudly in the garden, with just a few finishing touches needed before it is ready for use by residents to enjoy in this lovely setting.
Our wonderful in-house art clubs
26th March 2019
Our regular in-house art clubs are popular at Rockdale and we are extremely grateful to the talented volunteers who kindly run them. We also have many talented residents!
Three Arts Festival
20th March 2019
Click through for Sevenoaks Chronicle article, dated 14th March with mention of Rockdale.
Hellebores
20th March 2019
Our beautiful Hellebores, enjoying a glimmer of sun!
Hellebores are sometimes known as the Christmas or Lenten rose and are perennial garden plants with elegant flowers, perfect for brightening up some of our shady areas during late winter and early spring.
Knit-a-Chick campaign for Hospice in the Weald
13th March 2019
Our residents are supporting the Knit-a-Chick campaign for Hospice in the Weald.
The chicks will be sold at the Hospice reception and in their 27 charity shops to raise vital funds for the Hospice.
How cute are these? 🐥
Summer house foundation
12th March 2019
Luckily, we enjoyed some dry weather last Thursday, when cement arrived for our new summer house foundation. We are waiting for another dry and calm day (certainly not today!), for the next stage of the summer house build.
Kent Police community placement
7th March 2019
The residents and staff at Rockdale House were delighted to enjoy the company of PC Wayne over the last few days, whilst with us on his community placement for Kent Police.
Our residents enjoyed activities with Wayne, such as Jenga, carpet Bowls, exercise classes with musical instruments and just having a good chat. Happy to turn his hand to anything, Wayne also got stuck into some housekeeping and helped residents who asked him to do something for them, like fix their razor.
Anita Cleugh, CEO at Rockdale said, “We feel very privileged to be part of the Kent Police Community Placement Scheme, which forms an element of equality and inclusion training for all new Police Officers in Kent. The Scheme provides the Officers with a chance to practice communication styles and interact with a range of diverse groups they may have had limited involvement with perhaps in the past, which can be daunting especially for the younger Officers. Our residents also really enjoy the additional attention, making full use of any extra skills the Officers may have. It’s a great scheme and Rockdale House is very proud it is able to help shape the Police Officers of the future.”
Wayne echoed our feedback and said it was an extremely positive experience all round.
Thank you PC Wayne for your time, commitment and energy over the last few days, we all very much appreciate it.
PC Wayne is pictured with Jean and Dorcus, two members of the team at Rockdale.
Lucky Lawrie celebrates his 100th Birthday
28th February 2019
We were delighted to celebrate Squadron Leader Jack Lawrence’s 100th birthday with him this week. A resident here at Rockdale, Jack is known as Lucky Lawrie.
Read Jack’s incredible story in the Sevenoaks Chronicle this week and by clicking here.
Along with Queen Elizabeth II, family and friends, we wish Jack a very happy 100th Birthday!
Supporting our community
We were very pleased to be able to support Kent Police with their Community Care Project recently, offering a placement for a Police Officer in training.
Sian joined us for four days and met many of our residents in Rockdale House, both on a 1:1 and in the communal areas. The residents very much enjoyed Sian’s company, as did we.
We wish Sian all the best for her future career with Kent Police.
Our gardens are springing to life!
The gardens at Rockdale are springing into life and enjoying this early warmth and sunshine as much as we are!
Sevenoaks Three Arts Festival
Sevenoaks Three Arts Festival
We are delighted to be a friend of the Sevenoaks Three Arts Festival this year. Our residents can enjoy all these events for free. Please see the website below for more information.
Sevenoaks Young Musician of the Year Competition 2019
Sunday 3 March from 10.30am
at Stag Theatre, Sevenoaks
Supported by Sevenoaks District Arts Council (which is funded by Sevenoaks District Council),
Sevenoaks Town Council, Sevenoaks School, Reid Sohn Pi
More dates for the diary:
Saturday 8, Sunday 9, Saturday 15 & Sunday 16 June 2019
Prizewinner’s Concert & Presentation of Awards
Saturday 22 June 2019
The concert is presented as part of the Sevenoaks Summer Festival
Exciting kitchen plans for the Beatrice Wilson Common Room are becoming a reality!
31 January 2019
The Beatrice Wilson Common Room will soon enjoy a new, much larger kitchen! The picture from today shows that work is very much underway and in two weeks, it is hoped that the kitchen extension and refurbishment will be finished. We will share pictures with you as work progresses over this time. (more…)
Snowdrops
31 January 2019
We are experiencing the first of the snow, here in Sevenoaks and at Rockdale the beautiful snowdrops are starting to appear in front of Rockdale House.
Our 2019 Calendar is still available to purchase
21 January 2019
Our 2019 calendar is still available to purchase from the Lodge. They are £5.00 each and the calendar features art created by our people living here at Rockdale.
Margaret is Leaving
Today we sadly said goodbye to one of our key volunteers at Rockdale House, Margaret Lee. For nearly ten years Margaret and her partner in crime Penny have manned the Rockdale Shop for our residents offering them the opportunity to personally purchase that extra little something they fancy or need.
For our residents who find it more difficult to get to the shops the weekly visit of the Rockdale Shop, on Wednesdays, has proved invaluable and the time they spend at both Rockdale House amongst residents, as well as on their frequent trips to the supermarkets to stock up, is greatly appreciated.
On the other hand, we are delighted to announce that long term Rockdale friends Maggie Collins will be taking over Margaret’s role working alongside Penny. Maggie worked in Rockdale House for 12 years and, therefore, for some residents will be a welcome and familiar face behind the tills and the chocolate bars!
Folkestone Trip
On a very blustery Wednesday a group of residents set off on a trip to Folkestone. We were lunching at the Grand Hotel on the Victorian “Leas” but first we visited the Battle of Britain Memorial perched along the white cliffs on the Dover Road. This was a wonderful place to wander around workhorses of WW2; The Spitfire and The Hurricane.
One could almost imagine them taking off from the cliff top and flying into the distance across the sea towards France. Unfortunately we could not see across to France due to the weather. After coffee we boarded the coach and headed towards Folkestone town. The dining room was certainly grand with large crystal chandeliers sparkling down onto white table linen.
After lunch some of us braved the elements and were blown along the promenade, enjoying the sea air. We were looked after so well by the staff of the hotel and the cheerful coach driver. A truly lovely day out.