Recent News - Presbyterian Manors of Mid-America

01 Dec 2006

Christmas Gift Ideas, Memories Blend at Presbyterian Manor

So you have a relative—mother, dad, grandparents, brothers or sisters—in a senior residence, or still living on their own, and don’t know what to get them for Christmas. The best advice is to ask the experts. Residents of Presbyterian Manor in Arkansas City have a few gift ideas to share with you and the bonus is that they happily share some of their Christmas memories to go along with them.

Evelyn McKelvey, a lively almost 95-year-old who has been at the Manor for 25 years, says “residents can always use lotion, powders, and note paper.” And she creatively suggests that gift certificates to beauty shops, or other stores in the area, are always winners.

McKelvy was born in Nardin, Okla., nine miles west of Blackwell on the family farm. She came from a small family, but her favorite memories of Christmas are when her extended family (four families) got together for holiday dinners. “I always liked to be with the kids,” she says. “The boys played ball and the girls all played together.” There could be up to 16 children at the gatherings.

Joyce Burris, 81, formerly of Great Bend and Wichita, is a newcomer to the Manor. She just moved there in July. She, too, suggests lotion is a good gift idea “as our skin get dryer as we get older.”

She, too, equates Christmas memories with family. Though her holiday memories are a little bitter sweet since she lost her husband, Glen, five years ago right before Christmas. “I love the reason for the season, but I haven’t been able to enjoy the rest of it,” she explains. This year, however, she plans to decorate her apartment with a small tree.

She and her husband always cooked Christmas dinner together when the holiday responsibility passed on to them. Prior to that, her mother and father did the honors. And those dinners, she laughs, always started with egg nog. “Daddy loved egg nog, she says, and it was “liberally laced with nog.”

She still drives in town, she explains. If an invitation comes off campus, that’s where she’ll go for Christmas. Otherwise, she’ll be at the Manor, where there will be a special holiday dinner served to residents and their visiting family or guests.

Myrtle Bly, a very “young” sounding 93, looks forward to Christmas and says the best holiday gift is “just love and my family.” She’ll have both this year. One of her two daughters and two granddaughters from the Denver area will travel to join her at the Manor for the holiday and the special dinner that is provided for residents and their guests.

But she’s also got other great gift ideas for seniors. If they can still read, she says, “magazine subscriptions are just great.”

If their eyes are failing, “one of the most wonderful things is a cassette player and book tapes. You can sit in your easy chair, or go from room to room and listen to those.” There are local library programs where tapes are available for lending, she adds. Some even provide the player.

She also says compact disc players likewise are a good gift-- and just the discs if the person already owns a player are wonderful.

Like others at the Manor, her memories of the holidays center on the family coming together for Christmas dinner. A Kansas native, she was born in Perry, but grew up in Burlingame on a farm. She’s been at Presbyterian Manor for 12 years. Bly recalls that her father had a special tabletop made to sit on their dining room table so that all of the family—as many as 14—could all sit at the same table. “We never had a children’s table,” she adds. “Everyone—adults and children—gathered at the same table.”

Most memorable, Bly says, “We always held hands and sang the doxology.”

“We don’t need much, really,” is a phrase you’re likely to hear time and again from seniors.

Probably one of the nicest gifts residents receive is to join family or friends to celebrate. “Some residents really look forward to going out,” says one Manor resident, and many did leave the Manor for outside family dinners this Thanksgiving.

Another indicated that one family brought in food to spend the holiday with its family member who lives in a Manor apartment.

The important lesson to take away, however, is that it’s nice to be remembered--no matter the size, or the nature, of the gift.

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