January 17, 2015

Teen Birthday Party of Arting!

Good evening!!

Yesterday, I spent my night hanging out with a gaggle of 11 fabulously giggling teenage girls! Yep! That’s right!! It was my niece, Megan’s, birthday slumber party, and I got to be a part of her big surprise of the night by surprising her and her friends with an art class customized just for them!! 😉

Here is the birthday girl with her finished art piece:

Not having taught an art class for teens in over 15 years, I was both nervous and really excited to see what I could come up with! I was ready to teach 8 girls for 2 hours, and ended up teaching 11 – EEK! That was alright, I had supplies for 12 – WHEW!!! Thank goodness I am an uber planner!! 😉

The night's sample project! A 10x10 mixed media canvas — The night’s sample project! A 10×10 mixed media canvas

The thoughts behind this canvas was that each girl would create a self portrait mixed media canvas with a personalized love letter to themselves! The only rules we had, while we were arting was that we were not allowed to criticize our work, and that they had to decide for themselves whether or not their self portrait looked like themselves. We, as girls, have a tendency to constantly be looking to others for affirmation that we are enough in all things. I wanted them to trust themselves in knowing what color their hair or eyes, or skin color looked like! They needed to affirm to themselves that their judgement was enough!

The girls did an ABSOLUTE SMASHING job!! Not only in creating some AMAZING artwork, but in staying focused, being positive, and hanging in there when something unexpected happened on their canvases!!!

Just look how focused they are!!

We took these canvases one step at a time, and made sure to take plenty of breaks as needed! During breaks we played “Down By the Banks”, “Angels in the Graveyard”, “Statues”, and there was dancing, LOTS and LOTS of DANCING!!! 😉 They made me feel like a teen again myself!! 😉

Anyway, instead of trying to figure out a way to teach the girls how to draw one of my whimsical long neck girls, I took the time before class to draw a generic looking long neck girl and provided a copy for each girl! It would be up to the girls to, not only color their paper girls themselves, but they also had to draw their own hair, because the only thing my sample girl had was generic bangs! All of the girls did such an AMAZING job on this, really blowing away all of my expectations on how they were going to work out!

As they were getting ready for their first break, to let their art work dry a little bit, one of the quieter girls, turned around and said to me, “Excuse me, this girl is supposed to look like me, but I wear glasses every day, and I don’t know how to draw glasses.” OMG! You could have knocked me over with a feather!! How could I have not thought of that!?!?!?!? Well, I told this dear sweet girl, her name was Laticia, we would draw her some glasses. I would draw, and she could be my model!! I dug out my good drawing tools and got started!! She was so sweet and so patient, especially since I had never drawn glasses before IN MY LIFE, but in that moment I felt like she and I had become kindred spirits, and I needed these glasses to turn out perfectly! (being a glasses wearer myself, I know how they can become such an important part of your personal style!)!!! AND if I may say so, these glasses turned out AWESOMELY!!! I can honestly say that this became my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE portrait of the evening, and I am now inspired to draw glasses on a bunch of my girl drawings!! 😉

Isn’t she cute??? Both of them!! 😉

Every single one of these girls made my night soooooo much fun!!

Here is their silly face version:

By the end of the evening, I had assured all of the girls that because they now had created their own art canvases that were now officially artists!!! They were tickled pink by that! It was very easy to tell that they each had a really good time, which I was EXTREMELY thankful for!!! 😉

Here is a slideshow of all of the girls, (except for McKenna, who had to leave a little early, which meant I missed taking her picture! Sorry, McKenna!!):

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I am so proud of all of these girls! It was so much fun watching them learn something that at the beginning of the night they were sure would be impossible for them to do, to watching them pour heavily over what hairstyles to draw, which colors to choose, and what positive messages they were going to add to their personal canvases to create their own personal love letter to themselves!

They all did a SPECTACULAR job, and I honestly could not be prouder!! It was a lot of hard work, and at the end of the evening, as I was heading home, I was seriously beat, but MAN WHAT A NIGHT!!! I can NOT WAIT to do it again!!