Grace Point Place Residents Get Day With Families At The Beach

OAK LAWN, IL – Although a day along the sandy shores of Lake Michigan isn’t possible for residents of Grace Point Place due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, officials at the memory care facility this week found a way to bring the beach to Oak Lawn.

In the first time in which residents were able to welcome family members to the facility's outdoor space since mid-March, Tuesday’s Life’s A Beach event provided a welcomed respite for residents who had been sheltering in place for months, unable to visit in-person with loved ones.

As part of this week’s event, Grace Point Place had 1,000 pounds of sand moved into the facility’s courtyard and set up beach umbrellas and chairs and offered summer-time drinks to create a memorable environment for families to recreate memories.

“Sensory cues are especially important for those living with memory impairment because they stir recollections of pleasurable moments from the past,” Laporsha Chavers, executive director of Grace Point Place said in a news release prior to the event. “In creating this beach experience, our goal is to provide wonderful summer sensations and a family get-together that otherwise aren’t currently available to our residents because of the pandemic.”

Seven families were each provided 30 minutes of time in the courtyard with the area being sanitized between each visit. According to Shannon Dahlman, the facility’s community relations director, this week is the first time the courtyard has been open to outside visitors who are still not permitted to enter the facility.

Because of ongoing coronavirus concerns, all guests undergo a health screening prior to being permitted to enter and residents are limited to welcoming three guests at a time. Outside of the courtyard, window visits with residents are only allowed for the foreseeable future, which made Tuesday’s beach outing even more special.

“Bringing some sort of normalcy to those families with that connection was important,” Dahlman said Friday. “It really put a lot of smiles on our residents’ faces – to be able to see their family and put their toes in the sand – we really got a lot of good feedback.”

The beach event is the first of more that Grace Point Place had planned for the future. Dahlman said that the facility will host a social-distanced carnival and fair in its parking lot on from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. on July 25. The event will include a magician and other entertainment as well as hand-washing and sanitation stations that will be positioned around the parking lot.