Villa de las Flores Seniors are "Buzzing" About Return of In-person Arts & Crafts Classes

Residents at Villa de las Flores, one of our most actively participating communities in Imperial Valley, have always faithfully attended the arts & crafts classes organized by their PSCDC Resident Services Coordinator Layla Perez. During these classes, the residents exercise their creativity and have fun with neighbors in creating art pieces that they get to show off to the community with their art exhibition at the end of the year. Even during the mandatory stay-at-home order last year, the senior students of the arts & crafts classes continued meeting online to encourage each other and spread love, positivity, and togetherness during a very lonely time.

"The crafts class at Villa de las Flores is one of my favorite classes that I give," says Layla Perez. "I love my senior ladies; they are so much fun!"

Almost all of the class's crafting projects come from Pinterest, with many projects already completed though other ideas come from Layla's sister or Luz Vallejo, PSCDC's IMperial Valley Director of Services. Layla and the residents use their creative innovation to transform household supplies into extraordinary crafts to help keep the class and projects affordable. In this crafts class, unused flowerpots become fairy houses, coffee cans, spoons, and forks create wind chimes, flower wreaths start as egg cartons, and coke bottles get turned into piggy banks. There truly is no limitation to the resourcefulness and creativity at Villa de las Flores!

The slow reopening of services at our Imperial Valley properties has opened the community room at Villa de las Flores for residents to get together again. This year's first collaborative project is a decorative beehive from flower pots. The success and impact of Layla's arts and crafts class is a prime example of why we provide our services.

"We are all so glad to be back in the community room having the crafts class. It is a diversion for my ladies and helps them socially and mentally having something meaningful to do. They tell all their family members and have me take pictures so they can show their sons, daughters, and grandchildren."