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Lake Prince Woods EveryAge Senior Living residents can look forward to two fall events as the holidays approach. The retirement community will host its Veterans Day Appreciation Ceremony at 11 a.m. on Thursday, Nov. 9, at the Portsmouth Center. They will also be hosting their Fall Craft Fair and Bake Sale from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 11, at the community’s location of 100 Anna Goode Way.

The Veterans Day Appreciation Ceremony will feature the Lakeland JROTC, the Nansemond-Suffolk Academy Band, and a guest speaker from Joint Base Langley-Eustis. Family members of Lake Prince Woods retirees are invited to attend as well. Lake Prince Woods Resident Services Director Amy Henry talked about what residents can expect from the ceremony. 

“One of the things I’m excited about this year is that we do have the band coming, so there will be some music and the color guard,” Henry said. “I think having that color guard is important. Being able to play music that speaks to them and hits a cord for them. So that’s something that we’re excited to have…,” Henry said. “It’s nothing over-the-top, huge, but I think sometimes it doesn’t really have to be. They like the time. They like the time spent, they like the fact that people do take the time just to show them a little bit of appreciation and sometimes they have not always gotten even just a small amount of appreciation.”

Henry also noted that prayer will be provided to residents for their wellness. She expressed the importance of prayer as well as showing Lake Prince Woods residents that they still matter.

“Praying over them to me is important for continued wellness in life. A lot of times people come to a community like this and they feel like they’re forgotten or put out to pasture. We want to make sure that they don’t feel that way. So even if it is something small that we can do to make sure they don’t feel that way, I’m all about it,” Henry said.

She also talked about the Craft Fair and Bake Sale, which, along with arts and crafts and baked goods, jewelry, and other items, will be available for purchase. The fair will also serve as a fundraiser to raise proceeds for the Alzheimer’s Association.

“It does help us raise additional funds and bring about awareness, but a lot of our residents here, they’re very much into their crafts. This gives them a chance to put them on display and we do have outside vendors coming as well, so it’s not just all crafts,” Henry said.

The fair will be open to the community to attend. Regarding the Bake Sale aspect of the fair, Henry especially noted how serious residents can get with their baked goods.

“Whenever we have a bake sale, boy, they bring on the baked goods. And I noticed it last year which was the first year I did the Craft Fair and Bake Sale. I didn’t think there was going to be that many baked items and could not believe what showed up,” she said with a laugh. “It was a lot!”

Henry reflected that goods from last year ranged from cupcakes, cookies, “beautiful breads” such as banana and cranberry apple, pies and much more – including Neiman Marcus “$250 recipe” cookies. On what she wants attending residents and their families to know, Henry says Lake Prince Woods wants people to be aware of the “great things that we do.”

“[These] are just a couple highlights,” she said. “Every month we try to plan a full calendar that hits all those dimensions, and we want family members involved because then that’s the best way we can honor our seniors. Whether they’re veterans or they’re just our regular seniors that are civilians, just having family members present or even just in general … I think when family members can’t be present, sometimes just having other community members, it still gives them that sense of having people in their lives. And that is so important.”

Henry continued.

“One of the challenges that we do face is that it’s really easy as they transition is for them to get held up into their little space and not venture out, and that has been the biggest challenge that we face here, is getting them and keeping them involved. And especially as things do start to decline, as they do start to hit some of those challenges in the aging process, then they start to retreat. And so, that is always a challenge,” Henry said.

For more information, call (757) 923-5513 or go to facebook.com/LakePrinceWoods.