On April 12th, Artsy Mamas hosted a writing artshop for mothers at the Edmundson Branch Library in Nashville. Meredith Grey was our instructor and she did an excellent job of helping everyone feel really comfortable and at home. She provided us with handouts that included a variety of writing prompts and exercises. Personally I could not believe how much work I got done in just a few short hours! We did a lot of free-writing mode types of exercises... which is what I'm used to. I share some of what I produced as a result of these exercises
here. However, my favorite part of the artshop was our dabbling with "making stuff up". I've never been fond of writing fiction... mostly for fear that I couldn't do it. I managed to squeeze out four plays when I was in college and I was convinced that that was it... a certain TMBG song comes to mind, "There's only three plays in me and I just wrote the fourth. Don't know where I got the inspiration or how I wrote the words."
At any rate, one really cool exercise that Meredith introduced was the use of visual
prompts. She laid three post cards out on the table as shown in the photo to the right. Then we were supposed to begin a story based upon one post card. I found it surprisingly easy to become lost in the Crystal Pistol, imagining the types of women who would walk inside inquiring about the Burlesque Dancer positions available. I plan to use that writing exercise again one day.
We also had to "interview our characters". I had a lot of fun making up a character and finding out more about her personality and life.
This was such a fabulous artshop! I thoroughly enjoyed myself and I hope that we can have another one day soon. For more information on attending or hosting your own artshop, please contact Mandy at shebrakes4rainbows@gmail.com.
The kids sat and listened surprisingly well. Then we learned to sing two songs about recycling. We talked about recycling and being good stewards of the Earth. Then I was nice and let them get to what they really wanted... healthy bunny snacks and crafts.
We made Rain sticks and Toilet Paper Roll Friends. In our rainsticks, we used popcorn. And we put the ends on with rubber bands... which seemed to work fine as long as the little ones didn't pull them off!
You can learn how to make Rain sticks here and find templates (both black and white and color) to make your own toilet paper friends here.
No need to throw out those cardboard tubes anymore! Now they can be made into toys for the little ones!!
prompts. She laid three post cards out on the table as shown in the photo to the right. Then we were supposed to begin a story based upon one post card. I found it surprisingly easy to become lost in the Crystal Pistol, imagining the types of women who would walk inside inquiring about the Burlesque Dancer positions available. I plan to use that writing exercise again one day.
And the kiddos had fun modeling them.
