You are invited to…
Volunteer your Creativity with Magic Me!
“Staff and customers would like to say a massive thank you to Magic Me for your generosity, especially in troubling times like these it is lovely to see such kind heartedness.” Care Home staff member
What is The After Party?
In March 2020, given the changing circumstances around COVID-19, we were no longer able to throw our monthly Cocktail parties in 18 care homes and extra care schemes across London, as part of the Cocktails in Care Homes project.
In April 2020, we launched Cocktails: The After Party – an interactive project for Cocktails volunteers, Care Partner residents, staff and members of the public to keep creative & connected during this time – with weekly ‘Creative Actions’ designed by Magic Me’s team of professional artists.
How can I get involved?
-Visit our Creative Actions Archive here, to participate from home, where new activity will be updated until the end of Summer 2020. Care Partner residents & staff take part in the same actions – with their responses and messages to you shared in due course on our website and social media channels Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
-You can also download printable PDF versions of our ‘Creative Actions’ by visiting this page.
-Send your responses to our creative actions to sarahwatson@magicme.co.uk.
If you’d like to send us your responses another way, e.g by post – please call the number above and we would love to hear from you!
Can anyone get involved?
Yes! You do not have to be a former volunteer of Cocktails in Care Homes to take part – everyone is welcome to participate in our ‘Creative Actions’ – get creative, and connect with our care partner residents, staff, fellow volunteers and wider public during this time.
Why should I get involved?
The After Party is part of Magic Me’s At Home Together Programme, offering interesting, creative activities which encourage interaction between people, grows intergenerational understanding, while relieving social isolation and loneliness. Relieving social isolation and loneliness for those living in care homes and extra care schemes has been a key aim of Magic Me’s work for the past 30 years, by bringing older and younger generations together through meaningful creative activities.
Lockdown has allowed younger generations to experience what many of those living in care contexts experience on a regular basis. As Magic Me Director Susan Langford writes in a recent Magic Me blog post “…when lockdown ends for you, too many people will still be indoors, watching from the window, waving from the door. And they need you to remember what this feels like and to keep the pressure up, so things change, so no-one gets forgotten. At Magic Me our approach has always been to offer care homes new opportunities and great activities, here, now, today. But alongside this our longer aim is to ensure older people, their families and the whole care home community of staff, families and visitors are not forgotten.” Read the full blog here.
The restrictions on social engagement and interaction that lockdown has brought upon us, has propelled us to find community connectedness in new ways. We are firm believers that creativity, curiosity and play are important conduits to an increased sense of wellbeing. By Volunteering your Creativity on The After Party and sending us your responses and artworks guided by our ‘Creative Actions’ you are supporting us to continue our work building stronger intergenerational connections, and community across London and beyond, while connecting creatively with Care Partner residents and staff during this crucial time.
We have had fantastically positive feedback from many of our Care Partners (read more here!)
“It’s nice to see pictures of volunteers.”
“We have received the care packages, thank you for thinking of us. We love the colourful birds!”
“The postcards activity hit a note with the residents, we have sent some out to our volunteers – from Magic Me and others. The legacy of this still goes on and we are still making them. It allows the residents to think about the outside.”
“You are really making a positive impact.”
“It’s the little things – it’s unexpected.”