Juliette Best has always been an advocate for health and wellness.
She has been a registered massage therapist for 13 years and owns her own wellness clinic in Aurora.
But when COVID-19 hit the community, she was forced to shut the clinic doors, and is now staying inside at home with her husband Ryan and their three children Sarena 11, Cameron, 6, and Cayden, 3.
"I really felt a desire to still help my community in both Bradford where I live with my family and Aurora where my Wellness Centre is," she explained.
With the kids cooped up in the house all day and trying to to keep the children entertained, she decided to do something to try and boost their spirits.
"My kids were eager to connect with their friends and other kids so we had the idea to put their art in the windows to hopefully make people smile as they walked by," she said.
They started with some positive messages and putting them on their windows for passerbyers to see.
One day while out walking through the neighbourhood, her six-year-old Cameron asked why no other windows were decorated like theirs.
"So I said Ok Cameron, let's tell everyone."
And that was the start of of #KidsWellnessWednesday, a social media initiative on Instagram to get other kids inspired to create craft projects.
Best and her kids connected with the BWG Library to get the program more publicity. So now, every Tuesday Best comes up with a new craft idea and the library posts it on their social media for everyone to participate in and showcase in their windows for Wednesday morning.
So far some of the projects have included a "Just Keep Swimming" aquatic theme, a "We Bloom Together" spring theme, "We're Going on a Bear Hunt" and "Somewhere Over The Rainbow."
"Wev'e had lots of great feed back from the community and now when the kids go out they are so excited to see how many houses and families have taken part in our initiative," she said.
Best said she is now trying to get other libraries on board with the project.
"Our current situation has challenged me to find a way to still do this within the confines of my home. Thanks to social media we can still reach out and help people and that makes me happy."
They encourage all families to follow along in the craft project. You can find each week's activity on their Instagram account @Kidswellnesswednesday.
