Skill Share Schedule for Winter 2010

All are welcome to join us in sharing skills for healthy living.

February 4, 2-3 pm	BEYOND SURVIVING TO THRIVING: Struggling to survive uses particular skills and resources to stay alive and safer. When we start meeting our basic needs and accessing resources, new uses for the same skills and new skills can help to be healthier, safer, and more happy in the longterm.
February 11, 2-3pm	AGING WITH HEALTH: Guest Presenter Rev. Genie Kinney, Director of the Doris Kraus Senior Center Hear and discuss ways to stay as healthy, active, and mobile as possible while aging with grace. Knock down ageism!
February 18, 2-3pm	HYGIENE AND HEALTH: Getting and keeping healthy is easier with some basic hygiene steps. Learn hygiene truths and misconceptions, discuss tips and resources, find paths around common barriers, sample products to practice with and take.
February 25, 2-3pm	GARDENING PROJECT UPDATES: Presenter Case Garver, Lutheran Volunteer Corps worker at Welcome Have you heard about Welcome's community garden projects? Case has been setting up garden sites to grow food for meals and giveaway, with lots of volunteer opportunities to garden.
March 4, 2-3pm	IDENTIFICATION ACCESS: Have you heard about Welcome's ID Project? Every year, Jay helps many people to get birth certificates, state ID, Social Security cards, military papers, disabled transit cards, & other IDs. Learn about why ID is important, and how to protect your identity. Bring questions.
March 11, 2-3pm	AVOIDING ISOLATION: Feeling lonely? Isolation is a common complication of poverty, disability, and mental health distress. But there are free and easy ways to start building community and building a support network.
March 18, 2-3pm	MUSIC FOR HEALTH: Presenter Pete Feltman, pastoral intern & musician Music is a powerful tool toward health and mental health. Hear and see how music can help. All are invited to share in making music, but you're welcome to just listen if you prefer.
March 25, 2-3pm	BUGS AND THEIR REMOVAL: Guest Presenter Sara Page Hear about how to get rid of bugs safely and cheaply. Learn about what you can do about bugs in SROs. Bring or submit questions!

Skills Shared and Skill Shares

Have skills? Want to share them?
Want to learn skills by doing?

At our Tuesday Welcome meals, we have begun sharing professional self-care/body care/hygiene when skilled volunteers are available.

We have begun with a monthly volunteer who has professional haircutting and styling skills, averaging six haircuts each month! It is hard to find free haircuts these days, and at best they are often a rough buzz cut. That is why is to so amazing that a Welcome has committed to providing professional haircuts monthly for Welcome guests.

Maybe you have a skill around self-care or body care that you could share Tuesdays 2-4pm. We are particularly looking for massage, holistic health practitioners, poverty/trauma-informed nursing, relaxation exercises...if you've got a self-care or health professional skill, we would love to talk to you about volunteering two hours monthly with our guests.

Thinking that you are not skilled in such ways? We can use your ordinary and extraordinary gifts in our regular programming, whether in cooking, cleaning, chatting with guests, visiting people who are isolated, or sorting clothing and toiletry donations.

And there is another opportunity if you are skilled in life, health, or nutrition skills- come share with a Health Skill Share class. Staff support includes facilitating discussion, help incorporating various learning styles, ground rules, and providing space and snack set up. Leading a Skill Share involves preparing 30 minutes of presenting or a 50 minute discussion on a particular health skill with time for questions and discussion.

Topics we would like to find skilled community members to cover in the future:
-Foot care
-All sorts of nutrition topics from poverty-informed perspectives
-Legal rights/questions around homelessness, poverty, and SRO housing
-Heart and lungs
-Vision care
-Community politics
-Transportation, pedestrian issues
-Many mental health self-care topics
-Safer sexuality

Interested? Contact Pete Feltman for general volunteering and Tuesday meals or Pastor Jay Wilson for Skill Shares.