Pass It On Roses

Paint Love joined the summer program at Clarkston Community Center and led a special event with families from the Georgia Center for Child Advocacy with Ellen Gadberry leading a paper-making workshop. Ellen is a master of engaging kids- putting her background as a librarian to use, she started by reading a few stories around the theme of giving and selflessness. The kids used scraps of colorful construction paper to create their own handmade paper circles. On the pieces of paper, kids were invited to write, draw, or just whisper, something they wanted to let go of. Then, using blenders (which turned into a group activity itself!), they blended the scrap paper and used homemade tools of cut yogurt cups and screens in frames to press the paper pulp into shape. Once the rounds were set up in the sun to dry, Ellen brought out paper rounds made by an earlier group, and the kids learned how to carefully tear and fold the dry circles into perfect little roses with empowering phrases written on the the paper stems. The root of the project is based in helping kids learn the power of giving, as they created one rose to keep themselves, one to give away to someone they know, and a third to pass forward to a stranger they don’t know!