“Welcome to Charlotte’s Web,” said Rene Schlangen, the activities director at Careage of Whidbey.

Residents of the care center recently performed a puppet show for day care children.

The show, inspired by the Reader’s Theaters that attracted a handful of people for skits and other small activities, was put on by about a dozen adult residents and Careage staffers.

The idea for a puppet show started in January, but it wasn’t until the beginning of March that production actually started. It took three weeks to prepare for the performance.

“As soon as I said it was for the day care, everybody just kind of jumped on,” Schlangen said.

There were five puppeteers for the show, and eight people responsible for narration.

Schlangen worked with the readers to familiarize them with lines.

“This has been quite a coup,” Shlangen said. “If you’ve ever been here, you know that just doesn’t happen.”

Staff member Lanida Brophy was responsible for making the patterns for the puppets, but it was some of the residents who actually sewed them and applied the faces on each of the puppets.

“This has truly been a labor of love,” said Schlangen.

The show attracted more than 30 adults, including residents, staff and family members, as well as about 20 children from the day care center.

“It was pretty remarkable how much they enjoyed this,” said Schlangen.

According to Schlangen, many of the residents were involved in the “art scene” in the past, in one form or another.

Because of this, Schlangen said she thinks that these sorts of events are important as therapy for the adult residents.

This was the first puppet show performed by the residents of Careage, but Shlangen does not plan for it to be the last. The goal is to do a Dr. Seuss show at the end of the summer.