Retirement complex living around the area — Great Oak Estates and Pennsylvania Place featured

Look for more Forever Young stories in the Seniors section on this web page

BY LORI FAYBIK, COURIER CORRESPONDENT

OTTUMWA — Retirees looking to cut back on all the day-to-day home maintenance and housekeeping might want to consider moving to a retirement complex.

Two places in Ottumwa — Pennsylvania Place and Great Oak Estates — both offer luxurious apartment or duplex style home options for a more relaxed enjoyable lifestyle, without forcing residents to give up their independence.

Plus, just in case it is ever needed, 24-hour emergency health care is just a push of a button away.



Living in an apartment

home at Pennsylvania Place

After the death of her husband, Thelma Covert realized she would not be able to take care of her home all by herself.

“It got to be too much to take care of inside and outside the way I know he would have liked me to take care of it,” she said.

“It put me in the hospital trying to take care of it myself. That stress can do terrible things to your body,” Thelma says.

However, this busy woman was not ready to give up her independence, either.

So, she headed out to Pennsylvania Place to check out the apartment homes.

“When I came here, I knew instantly this is what I wanted, you can have as much independence as you want,” she says.

“The first night I stayed here, I felt at home and that surprised me,” Thelma says. “I have loved it ever since. I thought so many times, I’ve really made the right move. The way everything fell into place, I knew I did the right thing.

‘I guess I made my family happy, too,” she says. “My son had worried about me at home alone.”

All the maintenance, 24-hour emergency call system, some meals and even housekeeping is included in the monthly fee Thelma pays for her lovely spacious apartment. Pennsylvania Place also offers patio homes.

“I enjoy the meals,” she says. Residents are provided a number of meal credits, which they can use as they choose. They can even invite guests in for a meal. Residents are allowed gracious menu choices in an elegant dining room with entrees such as smothered pork chop, Polynesian chicken breast or seafood platter.

Residents can use a smaller private dining room for birthday parties, family reunions, etc. A private guest suite is available for overnight guests.

“The activities are nice; they keep you busy,” Thelma says.

She likes to make it into the fitness center about three times a week, to use the treadmill and exercise bike. She makes good use of the card/game room. The facility also includes a computer room, library, beauty/barber shop, arts and crafts studio, large whirlpool spa and more. Some organized games include bingo, pitch, rummy cube, dominos, cards, and sequence. There are stretch and tone classes, Bible studies and more.

“Well, I’m busy all day,” Thelma says.

She gets up early and eats breakfast in her own full kitchen most days, although she can go to the main dining room if she wishes. She still drives and gets out quite a bit to go shopping or visit friends and family. She might invite a friend over for lunch in the dining hall, but usually she just waits and has dinner in the evening for her main meal. Thelma enjoys walks and participating in the many activities at Penn Place.

“They always have something new, very great entertainment,” Thelma says.

Music programs are provided, recent released movies are shown weekly and other entertainers come in frequently. Thelma was especially pleased with a recent performance by mime, John Faxon Gilbert Jr.

“This is the only place I know of that furnishes all this at no extra charge,” Thelma notes.

Residents have also been provided transportation on trips to places like, Pella, Bonaparte, Centerville and the Amanas. Longer overnight trips are planned in the future. They do some sight seating, get a bite to eat and maybe do a little shopping.

“What woman doesn’t like to shop,” Thelma says.

She has a private balcony where she cares for several beautiful flowers and enjoys all the humming birds that flock to her feeder.

For Thelma, living at Penn Place offers her the piece of mind in knowing that all the maintenance and housekeeping is taken care of. They even come in and change her light bulbs if she wants. It gives her a chance to relax and participate in her favorite activities.

“You can just enjoy life, which I think I deserve after all these years,” Thelma says of life at Pennsylvania Place.

Thelma grew up in Davis County; she would have been married 56 years this year. Along with her husband, she raised her two sons in the Ottumwa area. She is proud of her two grandchildren. She has worked at a few different places including, Answer Iowa, in a doctor’s office and at Northwestern Bell.

For more information on Pennsylvania Place, call Brenda Miller at (800) 332-5351.



Living in a twinhome

at Great Oak Estates

Raymond and Jeanette Curtis are not ready to give up having a home of their own.

However, when Raymond started having some heart problems, the couple found it difficult to maintain their small acreage with the garden and fruit trees and all. So, the couple turned to Great Oak Estates.

“Ray says we’re moving, so we did,” Jeanette says.

Raymond adds, “We decided to do it while we are able to make the decision. I thought something like this would be good; all the work is taken care of, yet we have the convenience of our own home.”

Great Oak Estates is a senior development offered by the Ottumwa Good Samaritan Rehabilitation and Health Center. It provides retirees the choice of a twinhome or an apartment in The Lodge.

Raymond and Jeanette selected a twinhome; a good sized luxurious two-bedroom home with garage and private redwood deck. They explained that they made a down payment that will one day be reimbursed when they leave the complex.

Now they pay a monthly service fee that includes paid utilities, a 24-hour emergency response system, complete maintenance of grounds, building interior and exterior, mowing, snow removal and housekeeping.

“They made us pretty lazy,” Raymond says.

The couple can enjoy all the amenities at the center, such as a nice recreation/exercise room, a two-story library, special activities and group picnics. A golf course will be available soon.  In addition, they are first on the waiting list to get into the care center if that is ever needed.

They could choose a meal plan as well, but Jeanette says she prefers to do her own cooking.  They do make it up to the center for a nice meal on Sundays.

Their little dog, “Pudge,” is part of the family, so they chose Great Oak Estates in part because pets are welcome even at the center.

It was a bit of an adjustment moving from a three-bedroom acreage to a two-bedroom twinhome. Jeanette says they gave a lot of the extra furniture to two grandsons, for an apartment when they returned home from serving in Iraq.

Raymond and Jeanette both have hobbies that take up quite a bit of space. She loves to sew, does some canning, and enjoys playing bridge with friends. Her hus band’s woodworking is displayed prominently throughout the home. They even downsized to just one car so that half of the two-car garage could be used as his shop.

Jeanette says that Great Oak Estates staff handled all the details of the move into their twinhome. The staff packed and unpacked everything, even hanging pictures on the wall.\

Moving into town hasn’t stopped them from enjoying the great outdoors. They have a lovely wooded back yard where they feed birds and deer. Wild turkey have even been known to roam through the neighborhood. Living in a twinhome has given them the opportunity to continue growing flowers and even a little rhubarb.

Raymond and Jeanette have been married for 63 years. They have two sons, six grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

He served in the Navy before retiring from John Deere as a Tooling Engineer; she was a homemaker and worked for the phone company. They have done a lot of traveling, visiting every state except Hawaii and even took a trip to Sweden, Norway and Denmark. They have built eight homes in the Ottumwa area, doing all the work themselves, evenings and weekends.

“I did a lot of roofing,” Jeanette says.

Now, they are finding time to enjoy all their hobbies while letting Great Oak Estates take care of all the day-to-day maintenance.

“We’re very comfortable, we like it out here,” Jeanette says. “They are very accommodating.”

For more information, call Great Oak Estates at (641) 682-8041.

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