Everyone was in attendance as we began the new year and celebrated Allison's birthday!
Happy New Year! As we inch ever closer to our 10th anniversary in March, we have so much to look forward to in 2026. This week we welcomed a friend back after a long absence, enjoyed bowling, completed service work, and celebrated birthdays of two special friends, just for starters! Here's a look at our first week of 2026.
Tuesday
It was a very Happy New Year as we returned from Winter Break to welcome Tessa back to our group! She's been recovering from an adverse reaction to a medication that left her extremely weak and unable to walk for months. We followed her progress to regain her strength, and cheered for her along the way. Seeing her step off the WATA bus this morning made us so happy! WATA driver John was there to offer her a hand, but she came down the steps all by herself!
Welcome back, Tessa!
We kicked off 2026 and the beginning of January with our monthly bowling trip. Everyone enjoyed watching each other bowl, offering cheers and encouragement as usual.
Everyone was here today, plus Cameron joined us for a few days! Look at these happy bowlers. We even got a surprise visit from Bowlero's former manager, Wendy! Shoutouts today to Devin and Alexis for their great scores of 162 and 164, respectively!
Tracy and Katrina paid us a visit, and brought our second surprise visitor of the day, JaVante! He's home on break from the University of Tennessee, where he's pursuing a master's degree. It was great to catch up with him, and hear that he is doing very well in Knoxville!
We ended the day taking down our December decorations and resetting the calendar for January. We've got a ways to go, but January will come to life in our room over the next few days!
Today was Service Work Wednesday so it was back to the library for a group of our dedicated volunteers. Ms. Ortega always appreciates our help shelving books.
Laura, Ms. Ortega, Alexis, Michelle, and Gail wished each other Happy New Year!
We also arranged flowers (donated by Trader Joe's) for the residents of Commonwealth Senior Living, but we didn't get any pictures except for this one when Liz and Abraham delivered them this afternoon.
We sent a group of 9 to volunteer at Grove Christian Outreach Center. Cameron, Abraham, Erik, Drew, Michelle, Patrick, Gail, Alexis, and Thomas worked steadily for two hours to organize and pack food distribution bags. We enjoy getting to work with Thom, Ursula, Peggy, and Joel each week very much!
Thank you, Ursula, for making a banana bread streusel for us to take back to the center and share with all. Since we're celebrating Allison's birthday today with cupcakes, we will save it for a treat tomorrow! It smells sooo delicious!
Speaking of Allison, her birthday was on December 31 while we were on break, so we got to celebrate her today! Those who were at the center while the others volunteered at Grove finished up the flower arranging and got busy making lunch. Bryan and Devin checked the spinach for our pasta salad to make sure each leaf was perfect!
Liz worked on baking cupcakes, which we planned to decorate with lots of sprinkles because Allison always "sprinkles up" the treats she makes for us!
For our first party of the year, we needed some pretty decorations, so Laura, Kate, Xavier, Devin, and Tessa colored a few pictures. Soon we will replace our "old" crayons and colored pencils with new ones, courtesy of a generous donor! (More on that next week!)
Allison's birthday board with the green background was popping with beautiful cards we made for her!
Our birthday lunch consisted of tasty bbq chicken sandwiches, pasta salad, and crisp apple slices. We thought it was great, but more importantly, so did Allison!!
Happy Birthday, Allison, and we hope all your wishes come true. Thank you for being a dedicated volunteer, and a beloved friend. We appreciate you very much!
We started a new read-aloud after Choice Time. Since 2026 is America's 250th anniversary, we're going to read historical fiction, starting with George Washington's Socks (a time travel adventure) by Elivra Woodruff.
Today was National Bobblehead Day, so we ended a fun afternoon with a fun craft. Check out our snowmen bobbleheads made with paper cups, pipe cleaners, googly eyes, and pom poms! They look so cute in our window sills!
Thursday
Lisa came down with the flu and was absent today, but we kept rolling with Carol, Nan, and ALL of us leading the way!!
We got ready for Christina's birthday, which we are celebrating tomorrow. She's going to make snow globes with us, so we are decorating with a lot of snowy things today. Tessa enjoys cutting things out such as pictures and bubble letters, and she's very good at it!
We think Christina will love her birthday greeting!
We also decorated foam snowflakes with pretty "bling" and they will go in the windows. The temps have been near 60 for a couple of days, but we're channeling winter in our room!
We had time for learning, too! World Braille Day was on January 4th, so we had a lesson to remind us that people who are blind or visually impaired can read and write by using a tactile writing system called the Braille Alphabet. It was invented by Louis Braille, who was blind himself.
In between the learning and the crafting, we got lots of meaningful movement, too. We participated in a seated workout set to disco music, which was very challenging! We also took a brisk walk in the hallway. Always feels good to stretch our legs.
It was a good day!
Friday
Since Lisa was still out, we had to cancel our PSP work day. We appreciate Scott and Roxanne for their flexibility and understanding. We miss them! Here's a throwback pic from one of our early work days in April, 2022.
Since we weren't on the road at PSP, we celebrated Static Electricity Day! We watched a short video, and then tried some fun experiments to see if we could create static electricity. Always fun with this gang!!
We spent the rest of the morning getting ready for Christina's belated birthday party. Our tradition with her is to welcome her to our place each year around December 16, which is her actual birthday. We treat her to lunch, and she creates a fun craft project with us! December didn't work out for us to get together last year, so we planned the celebration for today! Lunch was breakfast casserole (also our tradition for Christina), fruit, and Ursula's delicious banana streusel bread. 😋
Instead of cupcakes, we had chocolately cinnamon rolls for a birthday treat!
Happy Birthday, Christina! We hope all your wishes come true! Enjoy your trip to Scotland, for starters!!
Next it was time to make snow globes! Christina has been excited about this project for a couple of months, and we're disappointed that the weather didn't cooperate with a few flakes today! Still, we enjoyed making them, and can't thank Christina enough for providing the supplies and the guidance as we went step by step to create our one-of-a-kind snow globes!
So pretty! Christina selected lots of fun characters for us to put inside, based a lot on what she knows about what our guys love!
Thank you for your friendship, support, and love, Christina! We love working with you!! We can't wait to welcome you to our new building where we will have an art studio. 🎨 It will be fun to create something with you there, too!
We're also sending a big shout out to Christina's husband, Michael! He works at Newport News Shipbuilding and recently designated a donation from a company savings plan to the Arc of Abilities! We made him a thank you card and told him how much we appreciate his generosity that will help support our fun and engaging activities! Thank you for thinking of us, Michael!
Here's more exciting news! The Arc office staff began moving into our new building this week! Once some minor renovations are completed, we'll be joining them...time for us to start cleaning out the cabinets and shelves! 😜
Tuesday: We are visiting the American Revolution Museum in Yorktown this morning to check out the Fresh Views of the American Revolution exhibit, which features the folk art of Oscar de Mejo. Since America's 250th anniversary is this year, we hope to visit a few of the special exhibits in the Historic Triangle as we continue to learn about the path to America's independence. We'll also celebrate National Rubber Ducky Day! Lunch on your own. JRES Cafeteria is serving Chicken Fajitas or Pizza.
Wednesday: Today is National Hot Pastrami Sandwich Day and since we've never celebrated that one...we'll have pastrami and cheese sandwiches with chips, fruit, and a pickle spear for lunch. We'll also do our Service Work at GCOC and flower arranging for CSL, so please wear Arc shirts. We'll have a follow up history lesson from yesterday's trip and continue our read-aloud about George Washington's socks, too!
Thursday: We're beginning a new community partnership today with the women of Williamsburg United Methodist Church (WUMC)! They have visited us a few times to do craft projects, and now they are inviting us to come to the church each month for group activities based around a particular theme. This month's theme is Fun and Games so be prepared to play games and win prizes! We're also celebrating National Hat Day, so feel free to wear your favorite hats/caps today, and yes, you can wear them in the building! (Well, maybe not at the church!) We'll return to the center for lunch on your own. JRES Cafeteria is offering Domino's Pizza or Grab 'n Go Deli Sub.
Friday: Today we'll go to Eaton for a work day, so please wear Eaton shirts and bring a bagged lunch. We'll likely return to AFCC for lunch, but not sure of the timing so we won't order from the cafeteria. We'll make birthday cards for our friend Cameron and have a lesson to commemorate Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, too. Time permitting, we may end the day with yoga with Jaime, so dress to stretch!
Have a great weekend and practice good hand hygiene! It's flu season!
Lisa, Carol, Nan, and the AoA Gang
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