by Lesley Forrester | Feb 11, 2020 | Activities, Fitness
Starting last Thursday evening, and ending Saturday night, Montreal received over 35 cms of snow. Sunday was the sort of day where you stood at the door and said, “Where do we go from here?” In any case, the snow ploughs and the dump trucks have been out...
by Lesley Forrester | Nov 24, 2019 | Activities, Creativity, Seniors
While many seniors at one time or another think about writing a memoir, many are discouraged by a lack of confidence in their writing ability, or are of the opinion that their stories are not interesting enough. Nevertheless, taking suitable time to write down stories...
by Lesley Forrester | Nov 6, 2019 | Lifestyle, Seniors
Blue Zones are the names given to geographic locations in the world where people typically live past 100. The benchmark for becoming a Blue Zone is having a centenarian rate that is an astonishing three times higher than the national average. Ikaria in Greece,...
by Lesley Forrester | Oct 9, 2019 | Housing, Seniors
In 1998, Shirley Meredeen was in her late 60s and together with Madeleine Lewis had founded Growing Old Disgracefully, a network established to challenge preconceptions of older women as passive and redundant. In the summer of that year, Meredeen attended a workshop...
by Lesley Forrester | Sep 24, 2019 | Intergenerational Living, Seniors Helping Others
The Foster Grandparents Program in the United States had its origin in the 1964 federal War on Poverty legislation. The program aims to give seniors across the country a purpose in retirement by providing some of the neediest children with mentors and giving...
by Lesley Forrester | Sep 16, 2019 | Activism, Legacy, Seniors Helping Others
The first group of Raging Grannies came together in a loosely knit fashion as anti-nuclear activists calling themselves “NERT — Nuclear Emergency Response Team.” When they began in 1987, they were eleven white, nearly all middle-class,...
by Lesley Forrester | Sep 12, 2019 | Activities, Creativity
A number of studies suggest that participatory arts activities within aging populations help to maintain the health and quality of life of older adults. These benefits include improvements in subjective well-being, tactile and cognitive abilities and dementia risk...
by Lesley Forrester | Aug 7, 2019 | Activities, Creativity
You can use the powers of the aging brain to heighten creativity. The aging brain takes after the creative brain in a number of ways. For example, the aging brain is more easily sidetracked and uninhibited than the younger brain, making it fairly akin to the creative...
by Lesley Forrester | Jul 17, 2019 | Activities, Fitness
Playgrounds designed for seniors are growing in popularity worldwide. In 1995, the first playground for older adults is believed to have been built in China in anticipation of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. China adopted a national law that resulted in a nationwide...
by Lesley Forrester | Jul 4, 2019 | Activities, Creativity
Play is especially important for seniors. As we grow older, many of us become more vulnerable to issues that can affect our health and contentment. Any activities, therefore, that help us to restore or prolong our vigour are essential. Play and fun are powerful...
