Here the participants are following the movements and responding to our original song “I Am Love” available on our website.
Everyone was so open, receptive, and loving, including the staff and participants. When you have clear movements and music, you really don’t need many words. They truly got our message of love.
We had a fantastic time in Portugal in September. We visited 3 Alzheimer’s adult day care center and happily shared Move With Balance® with Music. Here the participants are doing “ARROWS” from our book.
Move With Balance® with Music
at Kaunoa Senior Center, Maui
DATES: Fridays
September 2 —
Mentor training for new mentors; seasoned mentors can come, too. 9:30—10:30AM+
September 9 —
Department of Health pre-testing for mentees
9—11AM
September 16—December 9 —
Move With Balance® with Music classes for 10-weeks (off October 7, November 11 and November 25)
For mentors, mentees, and family caregivers
9:15—10:45AM
December 16 — Department of Health post-testing for mentees
9—11AM
If you have friends, neighbors, or family who might benefit from this Move With Balance® with Music class, please let us know. The cost is $60, which includes the book “Move With Balance®: Healthy Aging Activities for Brain and Body” (a $35 value). We encourage family caregivers. NO charge for family caregivers.
If you have already taken the class, you are welcome to sign up again.
Stay in touch and visit the website often to learn the latest news. www.site.movewithbalance.com
65 nonprofits, who work with people over 65, have been selected for a 65-hour fundraiser sponsored by Home Instead Foundation. 65 hours = Monday July 11, 7PM—Thursday July 14 12:00PM HST.
Giving Back, our nonprofit organization on Maui since 2000, has created an award-winning program Move With Balance® for elders 65+. We have been selected as one of the 65 nonprofits.
Home Instead will give $10,000 to the nonprofit who has the most donors, and $10,000 to the nonprofit who receives the most donations. We are going after the “most donors” prize!
Simultaneously, during the Home Instead 65 hours, Giving Back is holding a Fundraiser/Concert at the Makawao Union Church Sanctuary on Tuesday July 12 from 5:30—8PM. Bill Fuller is the musician, singer, songwriter, entertainer for the evening. We have all heard his beautiful, heartfelt music over the years. Come and support us while enjoying Bill’s amazing music.
Bill and I have teamed up to create Move With Balance® with Music for Alzheimer’s/Dementia. We have successfully completed 2 programs with great results. www.site.movewithbalance.com
Here’s how you can help:
1. Please blast out the attached flyer to your email list. It would be great to fill the sanctuary for this fundraiser/concert. It will be a fun evening!
2. Admission to Concert:
Please make a tax deductible donation to Move With Balance® on the www.give65.org/givingback site. You can either donate on your computer at the GIVE65 site beforehand, and bring your receipt to the concert; OR on our computers as you enter the sanctuary the evening of the concert. $10–20+ suggested donation. You don’t have to be present to donate.
Move With Balance® Fundraiser and Concert
Tuesday July 12, 5:30—8:00PM
Makawao Union Church Sanctuary
1445 Baldwin Avenue
Thank you! Karen “Freesia” Peterson and Bill Fuller
Last week Bill Fuller, our musician, and I were in Costco. All of the sudden a women gave us a huge smile, and then a huge hug, and then another huge hug. My mind was sorting through the various elders I have worked with over the years, and then I remembered her from a Move With Balance® with Music for Alzheimer’s/Dementia that we taught a year ago, June 2015. We remembered her, but the amazing thing is that she REMEMBERED us. We were warned that our clients would not remember us from week to week. But we knew they did, as each week they came into class and sang and responded to Bill’s original songs. What a truly amazing and lovely surprise that she remembered us a year later! Maybe not who we were exactly, but she remembered our deep, and loving connection.
—Karen Peterson
NEW YORK (April 25, 2016) — The Alzheimer’s Foundation of America (AFA), a non-profit organization founded to fill the gap that existed on a national level, assuring quality of care and excellence in service to individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and related illnesses and to their caregivers and families, awarded one of its Spring 2016 Bi-Annual Grants to Giving Back, an outstanding non-profit member organization in Paia, Hawaii, that shares AFA’s mission of providing optimal care to individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and related illnesses, and their families.
The $5,000 grant enables Giving Back to continue to develop and enhance educational and support services, and support families in need in their communities. The grants are a critical funding source for grassroots organizations, which play a pivotal role in their communities.
Giving Back’s mission is to prevent injuries from falls, and enhance cognitive functions among the elderly. The organization does this by employing fit elders as mentors to more frail elders, practicing exercises together in a safe, loving environment as part of their Move with Balance program. To find out more about the program, you can visit them at www.site.movewithbalance.com.
“AFA strongly believes in helping grassroots organizations in local communities in order to improve quality of life for individuals with Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias, and their families,” said Charles J. Fuschillo, Jr., president and CEO of AFA. “The organizations that were selected for these grants have demonstrated to be a remarkable resource for individuals with Alzheimer’s disease. The grant will allow Giving Back to develop a model for dementia and Alzheimer’s clients, and individualizing the program for the mentees. I congratulate Giving Back, and encourage them to keep up the great work.”
“We are thrilled to receive this funding from AFA. We plan to get our innovative Alzheimer/Dementia curricula and original music available on our website, and ready for national distribution,” said Karen Peterson, executive director of Giving Back.
“Besides each Alzheimer’s mentee having their own mentor, we include family caregiver(s) in our program by having them attend the classes with the mentees. We have found they DO the exercises between classes, and the results show. We are encouraging the whole family be involved, including children.”