pafa.net Rotating Header Image

From the Heart

Free Rice – Feed the World, Exercise Your Brain

Jun 26th, 2009
by pollyalida.
3 comments

I’d forgotten about the Free Rice website until a friend mentioned it on Facebook today.  For every right answer to their online quizzes, they donate free rice to the UN World Food Program. And now they have quizzes not only for vocabulary, but also math, foreign languages, geography, art and even chemistry.

I though I’d put my summertime procrastinating mood to some good use and have been refreshing my math skills and German vocabulary. I would have loved these when I was a kid (ok, I was a geeky kid!). Maybe your kids will too? Ok, it’s back to work for me. Or maybe it’s time to see if I know anything about chemistry?

Green House Homes – Elder Care Reinvented

Jun 30th, 2008
by pollyalida.
4 comments

I’ve been spending a lot of time looking at nursing homes, assisted living centers and senior living centers lately. I’ve seen some wonderful places and some not so wonderful ones. Today, I came across a new concept for skilled nursing homes that blew me away. Green House® homes, skilled nursing homes with a heart.

THE GREEN HOUSE® model creates a small intentional community for a group of elders and staff. It is a place that focuses on life, and its heart is found in the relationships that flourish there…. Its primary purpose is to serve as a place where elders can receive assistance and support with activities of daily living and clinical care, without the assistance and care becoming the focus of their existence… The Green House model is intended to de-institutionalize long-term care by eliminating large nursing facilities and creating habilitative, social settings.

Looking through the photo albums on their web site, these homes really do look like homes and are the polar opposite of what I’ve seen in some nursing homes. Here’s hoping this and similar concepts prove successful and become affordable for all. Dignity in aging. A simple wish.