Art & Creativity for Healing gives out 500 Healing Art Boxes to Camp Pendleton every year, each box containing 10 brand new art supplies and Art4Healing activities. This story shows the impact of a Healing Art Box
I have three children who attend San Onofre School. When they received their Art Boxes each of them began tapping into their creativity in different ways. My 5th grade son, who usually spends most of his time outside, doesn’t naturally gravitate towards creating through art. He would prefer reading or watching something when he’s indoors. Since he received the box I have noticed that he has decorated his journals with stickers, and has begun making comics in one of his sketchbooks.
My 3rd-grade daughter has made her sketchbook into an art journal where she glues pictures in, sketches (particularly girls in different outfits), and paints. She will also bring things home from school and glue them into her sketchbook. I’ve also seen her do an exercise she’s learned at an Art4Healing workshop where you express your feelings through color and abstract marks. I believe my youngest and quietest daughter has been impacted the most with the art box.
A day after she had brought home the box she was been really upset and crying. She couldn’t tell me why she was so upset. I later saw in her art journal a picture of a larges circle and a smaller circle with lines.
Next to the picture, it said “I’m sad when I miss my dad and mom” and her dad was deployed at the time. I saw that she was able to use the tools she got from the art box to express something she wasn’t able to tell me with words – although she was able to write down the words. She also was struggling with going to school every day. She would come home and say the only thing she likes about school is Art4Healing.
She’s had the opportunity to attend a workshop that was offered to the school and continues to ask me when they’re coming back. She has begun creating more because now she has more tools that she can call her own (she’s always had to share with her 3 other siblings including her toddler brother who unintentionally destroys their materials). We are so thankful to Art4Healing for giving our children the opportunity to create by giving them these special boxes. Thank you!
Parent of children at San Onofre School on Camp Pendleton
Healing for Heroes and Their Families Program
