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From the latest community news to our recent blog posts, we’ll keep you up to date on all the happenings at our active retirement community and more.

The Informer Newsletter
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December 6, 2019
Homemade Christmas Tree

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Rosie Whitehorne, Resident I grew up on a farm in northeast Iowa during the Depression and World War II years. Like many …

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December 5, 2019
Many Ways to Celebrate

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Allie Swanson, Team Member Christmas is celebrated in many different ways. As a child, one of my most memorable Christmases was celebrated …

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December 4, 2019
Remembering Christmas Time

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Joan Tipton, Resident When my children were young, and because family was not nearby and church services were late, we created our …

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December 3, 2019
The Real Gift Of Christmas

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Elvira Szigeti, Resident Our family followed the liturgical calendar, including Advent and Christmas. Mother loved for us to cut and decorate the …

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December 2, 2019
Such a Nice Man

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Betty Ruggles, Resident I remember waking up one morning and my dad had switches in his stocking. I was so concerned. My …

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December 1, 2019
Mother’s Christmas Saving Skills

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Elena Wiggins -Team Member When we were little and living in New York, we put our tree up on Christmas Eve every …

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November 30, 2019
Let’s Keep it Even

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Jacqueline Chaplin, Resident My parents never wanted to have the appearance of favoritism between my brother and me, so they worked especially …

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November 29, 2019
A Christmas Eve Tradition

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Barbara Fischi, Resident Excitement stirs in the air all the days before Christmas Day. When the young children begged for their gifts …

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November 28, 2019
Walgreen’s Saves Christmas

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Amy Chapman-Team member When my children were young, during the winter holidays, their gift requests were always pretty predictable. Jordan, my oldest …

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November 27, 2019
Time to Play

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Judy Johnson, Resident One of my favorite Christmas memories comes from a Christmas during World War II. My father had a hardware …

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November 26, 2019
Santa by Fire Truck

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Michael Shaw, Team Member My favorite childhood story involves a treasured Christmas tradition. Every year in Penndel, Pennsylvania, I visited my grandma …

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November 25, 2019
An Antsy Christmas

In Cedarfield tradition, the Pastoral Care Team created this compilation of holiday memoirs by team members and residents. We will share one a day through the holidays. Happy Holidays to you and yours! Sally Dvorak, Resident In December 1961, I was living in Bermuda with my new husband, Michael. It was our first Christmas together; …

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April 24, 2017
Introducing our new Executive Director

Upon the announcement of Nancy Brechtelsbauer’s retirement in December of 2016, the search for a new Cedarfield executive director was launched. After several months of searching, Virginia United Methodist Homes, Inc. is pleased to announce the appointment of Michael Shaw to the position starting April 2017. Shaw brings seventeen years of senior living experience to …

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May 27, 2016
Twenty Events To Celebrate Twenty Years

04/marked the beginning of a series of 20 events and activities in 20 weeks, which will conclude with a final big bash, Cheers to 20 Years, planned for August. See what has been going on at Cedarfield as we count down the 20 weeks!

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December 3, 2015
Giving Back to the Community

Driven 2 Destiny Outreach Center is a non-profit providing outreach and resources to people and families experiencing temporary set-backs due to unemployment, illness or other life-changing events. The center provides vocational training, parenting classes and more. They also offer Christmas Camps that give children a safe place to spend the day when school is closed …

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October 14, 2014
Cedarfield Special Care Center

Caring for a loved one with an advanced dementia disease (such as Alzheimer’s) can be overwhelming to families and friends. Statistically, a person with Alzheimer’s disease will live an average of eight years and as many as 20 or more years from the onset of symptoms. Eventually, 24-hour personal care may be required, whether in …

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December 14, 2020
Letters From Santa

For many years on Christmas morning, my daughter, Madison, received a personalized letter from Santa. By the time she joined our family, my employer had been writing a Santa letter to his granddaughter for a couple of years. He had closely followed Madison’s adoption journey throughout 1998, and that year he surprised us both with …

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December 13, 2020
Just Call Me Mrs. Santa

After my husband had open-heart surgery, he decided not to shave so that he wouldn’t have to worry with blood thinners. Soon his beard had grown out fully, and he returned to work. His co-workers were simply thrilled to see his new beard and told him that he would make a perfect Santa Claus at …

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December 12, 2020
Christmas 2020

I was a child in the 40’s, during the heat of World War II, and grew up in a household with my parents, grandparents, a maiden aunt, and a younger brother. Our church’s Christmas festivities were a special highlight each year. A favorite memory is always the Christmas Pageant that my entire family attended together …

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December 11, 2020
The Christmas Birthday Cake

Christmas was a very special time when I was a child, and still is today. I was one of six children, and a few days before Christmas, we would go looking for the perfect tree. We had some store-bought ornaments and lights, but we liked to make special ornaments. We all helped decorate the tree, …

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December 10, 2020
Following the Bells

On December 22, 2019, my husband, Jimmy, and I had been at Cedarfield exactly four months. This was the day of the Christmas Party in the Fellowship Hall for residents and team members, and we had missed it due to being called out for an emergency. About 4:00 that afternoon, I heard the faintest sound …

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December 9, 2020
Christmas at Matrosa Farm

While growing up, I spent many happy summers with my cousins at my aunt’s farmhouse in Concord, Virginia. Though we spent many summers there, we never went there for Christmas. As time moved on, my cousins and I had all grown up, married, and had children of our own. My aunt’s generation had all died,

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December 8, 2020
Christmas Then and Now

When my grandfather was a young man, he went hunting with Buffalo Bill and shot a moose. The moose head hung in his dining room above the buffet. Every year we went to his place for Christmas dinner, which was a very formal affair of turkey with chestnut dressing served on a silver platter by …

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December 7, 2020
Tall Santa

I remember when I was growing up that our family had a wonderful tradition of gathering at midnight on Christmas Eve to receive presents from Santa. My father was one of five boys, and they were all very tall. We had a large extended family and valued gathering together, especially during the holidays. Each year, …

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December 6, 2020
Christmas at Merchants Hope

The Merchants Hope Episcopal Church in Prince George is very dear to my family. My grandparents were married there, as were some of my aunts and uncles. There is a long-standing tradition for the children to have a breakfast with Santa during the first week of December. After the breakfast, there is a table with …

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December 5, 2020
Maggie

Santa does NOT bring live animals on his sleigh!” I said. “But, MOOOOOOM, all I want for Christmas is a dog! A black dog, like Buck!” my seven-year old son, Phillip, said. “Buck” was his aunt’s black lab and the only dog that he was not afraid of. Phillip did not just “say” he was …

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December 4, 2020
Christmas 2020-2021

I am standing here at the entrance to the Fellowship Hall on July 27, 2020. I have volunteered to be the “sanitizer” — squirting gooey stuff into the hands of all who come to join “Christmas in July” and spend time social distancing with our masks on. We are here to share our stories of …

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December 3, 2020
A Tale of Three Christmases

One summer a friend and I sat eating lunch at a drugstore in Kittanning, Pennsylvania, when I looked across the street and saw a handsome young man who resembled a tall, very thin young man — a friend from high school. We finished our lunches quickly to walk past him, and later that day he …

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