Grace Manor at Hunters Creek is officially open and is inviting Plant City to join its community.
The assisted living community is the first premier assisted community to come to town, according Executive Director Sheryl Vitelli. With 65 private suites, it aims to create a lively and accessible community for all of its residents.
“Not only do we want the seniors of our sweet little town to know we are here, we want the families to know,” Vitelli said. “We want them to know and understand that we partner with them and we want our residents to have a great quality of life and we want their families to also have a good quality of life. We’re just here to partner and help take some of the burden off.”
The apartments range anywhere from 204 to 504 square feet and come with features like granite countertops and mid-size refrigerators. As an assisted living community, they provide services like medication management and assistance with residents’ activities of daily living.
Grace Manor has been open for approximately four weeks and already residents are forming lasting bonds with their neighbors. Vitelli said the community offers everything from walking and exercise clubs to arts and crafts, games and a large variety of hobbies in the activities room.
There is also a massive game lounge featuring a pool table, a checkers table and a card table. If families want to reserve the private dining room for a special family meal or party, they can do so free of charge. On Sundays, the community has church services and there is now someone coming in to lead a Bible study with interested residents. Just this week, the residents went across the street to Brewer Park and fed the ducks.
One of the highlights of Grace Manor is undoubtedly the movie theater, which runs daily and shows feature films for the residents. Fresh popcorn is made prior to each show and Vitelli said it’s not uncommon to see residents round up their friends and head down to watch whatever box office hit is showing that day.
Friendship is one of the underlying threads of the community and, thanks to the extensive offerings at Grace Manor, it’s something the majority of the residents so far have quickly formed with their neighbors.
“We’ve had such an amazing time watching our residents truly come together like a family,” Vitelli said. “I literally get text messages on a daily basis from family members saying, ‘Hey can you go check on mom or dad, they’re not in their suite.’ We laugh and we joke and we’ll go and snap a picture of them sitting in a circle with their friends or sitting in the dining room having a cup of coffee or sitting in the movie theatre watching Mamma Mia because they were bored that day and they just went around and got each other and went to the movies.”
Frequently, Vitelli said, she has people say their family member will want to be by themselves, that they’re introverted and won’t want to spend a lot of time with groups, only to watch as that resident joins a variety of groups, is smiling and laughing with others during dinner, or is leading the charge during a card game with their new friends.
The atmosphere at Grace Manor is one of camaraderie and Vitelli said she hopes the community joins them in continuing to foster that mindset. Grace Manor is filling up fast and she said they expect to have reached capacity in the next few months.
Whether people want to volunteer or partner with the community to bring events and services to the residents, or simply want to take a tour to see if Grace Manor is the right fit for their family, she encourages them to give her a call at 813-743-3701. She is normally in the office from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and on the weekends by appointment.
Anyone interested is invited to attend the grand
opening ribbon cutting of Grace Manor on June 11 from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. Grace Manor is located at 765 W. Grant St. For more information visit gracemanorhunterscreek.com.