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October is Community Living Month

By Maureen Cameron
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Cresteramics summer carnival at Centennial Park was a success. (Jenneil Peters photo)

By Maureen Cameron

Thanks to Mayor Ron Toyota for an official proclamation for October as Community Living Month. Our participants and caregivers live, work and volunteer in our community, and we want to acknowledge the support that makes our program possible.

Community Living British Columbia (CLBC) is a crown corporation that funds, supports and promotes services to adults with developmental disabilities, as well as individuals who have a diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) or Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) and who also have significant difficulty doing things on their own.

In Creston, Cresteramics’ programs, as well those run by Creston and District Society for Community Living (CDSCL), are beneficiaries of this support to offer programs in our community.

Cresteramics’ mission is to achieve equality for people with developmental disabilities guided by principles of support, respect and inclusion while having fun. Today we offer nearly 30 different day programs, including supported employment, volunteer opportunities, high-school to adult transition programs, and various activities involving education, healthy living, and social development.

What a summer: As soon as someone said “let’s do a float in the Blossom Festival parade” the creative wheels and hands got busy and imagine the time it took to hand little crochet blossoms for the ‘tree’ as part of our theme for this year’s parade. The Blossom Festival is something everyone looks forward to planning and participating in every year.

While our adult day program continues year-round, we use the summer months to reach out to differently abled youth 13-19 to join us in a transition program. Anticipating that these youth will eventually age out of school supports, this offers them an opportunity to experience the day program, meet new people, explore group activities and provides families with an option for organized and supervised summer “things to do”.

Our first annual summer carnival in the park in August was a success at Centennial Park with participants, caregivers, staff, family and friends.

The festive atmosphere was complete with balloons, prizes and Cresteramics designed and made interactive games and music. Families in the park soon joined in, and we were surprised to find and include a group of friends visiting from Cranbrook.

Thanks to Creston Fire Rescue who showed up with the ladder truck and hoses of course and Creston Lion’s Club who came with free popcorn.

We enjoyed Warehouse Pizza for lunch, and yes, there was a pie and whipped cream “in the face” surprise for a few unsuspecting folks.”

Summer was a busy time at our Cresteramics store on Canyon where we proudly support 40 artists. Goldsmith Ron Hurry was an integral part of our experience there, and we, along with so many others, gave him a good send-off. Also, around town, our work program is supported by 25 businesses employing over half of our clients. Thank you all.

The success of Cresteramics comes from our caring and hard-working staff as well as the collaboration of local businesses, funders and an active board of directors. We have closure days for staff development and scheduling. Our team has unlimited options for self-paced training through open future learning. We conduct external as well as internal surveys on a scheduled basis which helps us with planning as it includes everyone. The positive feedback from recent surveys as well as achieving our second CARF accreditation (Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities) International accreditator and first board accreditation speaks to the dedication of all involved.

It takes a village…and as a way of thanking the community for their ongoing support, we are planning a community thank you at Save-On-Foods Creston on Oct. 17 from 10 a.m.-12 p.m. Come on by for treats and to meet us. Thanks to Save-On-Foods Creston for their support of this event.

We appreciate the following partners for additional program and project funding: Columbia Basin Trust, Gleaners, Royal Canadian Legion Branch 29, Associated Canadian Travellers and the town, and Regional District of Central Kootenay areas A, B, and C through Community Initiatives (Columbia Basin Trust).

Upcoming

Contact Donna McCready, executive director at 250-428-7412 for information. We have office space available for rent at the Cresteramics Store.

If being part of our team is of interest to you, board positions are available. Our AGM is Oct. 28, 2019, at 10 a.m. at the Downtowner Motel in Creston

Our website is cresteramics.ca.


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