Expressive Arts

Oh man it has been a while since I have last posted. Life has been very busy now that classes have started back. I never thought I would say this but I am ready for the fall semester to start because summer school is so intense! Not this past week but the week before I took the Expressive Arts Institute for Children and Adolescents. In other words we learned was of using expressive arts therapy techniques for working with children and adolescents. The class is taught through hands on learning so it was a lot of doing and creating art than it was sitting and listening to a professor lecture. Which was fine by me because I love crafting! By the end of the week however I was so burnt out! Below are pictures of some of my work :)

This was the front of my journal. I ripped up pictures from magazines to make everything excited for the purple part of the flower. That is cut from tissue paper. I had the front of my journal say "Be Open" because I wanted to remember to be openminded to new ideas that were going to arise throughout the week. 

This was a clay creature that I made the first day. We talked some about animal magic that morning and my animal was a raven. When we were doing some meditation before we created our clay figures I kept thinking about the raven as my professor talked. So this my attempt at a raven. 

This was the inside front cover of my journal. This is the one thing that doesn't really represent anything. I guess if I think about it, it could be how I want to be calm and go with the flow. 

This was a reflection about my clay raven. It is hard to read in this picture but pretty much right now I feel like a raven in a storm not knowing where I will find a job or when but when I do I will be like a raven flying into a rainbow. Thats the hope anyways haha!

The second day we did a drumming workshop. We pretty much just did some open drumming. The red represents my drumming pattern that I came up with where the other colors are when my pattern would grove with someone else's.  

On the left side is a representation of some of the improve acting type of stuff we did. It was a lot of fun. I was running out of time so I couldn't do a whole lot. On the right top I know it is hard to see but we were told to pick a shell from a pile. They all had other shells and things attached or growing on the. It is hard to explain.. sorry. We were asked to draw what we saw in or on our shell and then talk about what it could represent. The bottom is the inside back cover and I was just trying to make it match the front side cover. I used yarn to make the swirls this time which I thought looked pretty cool. 

This was an artistic reflection on the move meant that we did one morning. I think this was my favorite piece I made all week :)

On the left side is a journal response to a mindfulness walk we did followed by some meditation. For those of you who do not know what mindfulness is the best way I can think to describe it is it is a way of being fully present in the moment and not letting your mind wonder. The right on the bottom is a shape poem I wrote about looking for love. And the top is a reflection on writing poems. 

This is an artistic reflection on a poem I wrote about rain haha. It rained all week so it is what came to mind! 

This is the back of my journal. Since the front had a sun shine I thought the back should have a sun set. Again to make the sun set I ripped up magazine pictures to get the colors I wanted. The blue and purple is tissue paper. I wanted to bring in the raven again so I made it out of feathers. It says freedom because this week really helped me to find freedom from some of the mental noise that had started to bother me again. 

Ok so this is not something I made. It is a picture of my friend Morgan and my friend Mike's piece of nature. We were asked to find pieces of nature that spoke to us. When my friend Mike picked this flower the whole stem came off too. It was just too funny so I had to take a picture. Sorry Morgan!