Spreading the Love!

A few years back the idea was born for our Dance Expressions Honor Society to create and collect Valentines cards for elderly people living in a local care center. At the time, one of our longtime DE grandmothers, Mrs. Queen Walker, mother of Berdenia Stanley and grandmother of Sania Stanley (DE Grad 2022) was living at the Collington Senior Living Community in Bowie. That year Dance Expressions chose to share our Valentines with Mrs. Walker and the others living at the center, and a sweet friendship began between the studio and the center. Every year since then, our dancers have continued to create Valentines cards in order to share some love with the seniors living at Collington. This has truly become a favorite February tradition at Dance Expressions.

This year our dancers and their families crafted the most beautiful Valentine cards for the seniors. There were so many hand drawn pictures and sweet messages of love and encouragement. Congratulations and many thanks to Lyric Thomas, one of our hip hop dancers, for winning the prize for the most Valentines made! As you can see in the pictures, all of the cards were outstanding.

Ms. Pam dropped the Valentine cards off at the Collington Center on Valentine’s Day morning. There were many seniors with smiles and love in their hearts after receiving the cards.  The activity director loved and appreciated them. She even gave Ms. Pam a tour of their community building while she was there.  The building has a mini theatre with a stage and lights that would be a possible space for us to dance. We are working toward scheduling a small performance at the center in the near future.  Performing for local seniors in care centers was also a Dance Expressions tradition before the pandemic. We are very excited about the chance to bring it back!

Thank you to all who participated in this special Valentines service project this year. Your cards were amazing, and you all continue to inspire us. We’re so proud of you for spreading the love!

If you have other ideas on how we can love and serve our local community, please feel free to leave us a comment below.