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When the chicas looked outside this morning, they all saw SNOW!!! The chicas love snow (and the snowball fights they get into with Blanca) so there was no stopping them from coming to Crafty Chica today. Everyone was excited to come in out of the cold and see their mentors, we haven’t seen them since last year!! Many of of the 3rd Street girls have been hard at work making gifts for their mentors, and were very excited to give them. The mentors look so awesome in their new hats and scarves!

After a delicious meal of tamales and rice (made at our Sweet Things Bake Shop), we jumped into our craft; cozies!! Instead of making more trash every time we buy our coffee, tea or hot chocolate, we now have our own reusable cozy. We used lots of colors and buttons to decorate our creations. Our cups are going to be so stylish this winter.

I love crafty chicas because you get to show your creativity and its a lot of fun especially when there is a lot of people you get to  meet a lot of friends. If you are a crafty  person I think you should come to crafty chicas.

–Aysia, age 11

i love crafty chica because you can have a lot of fun you can do exiting things here.Also because you can talk with your mentor about almost everything. she’s like a best friend. In crafty chica we do lots  of stuff. My favorite craft is the scarf with the fingers and the ginger bread house, candy yay!

— Genesis, age 13

As you may already know, we here at The Lower Eastside Girls Club love to celebrate Mardi Gras. The colors, the glitter and the feathers!! Our favorite part is the masks. Like the “krewes” in New Orleans, we like to start early. We watched a couple of videos of masks from Mardi Gras and Carnivals around the world, and Laurie (our fabulous volunteer!) brought in her photos from venice. We discussed how other countries celebrate their last days before their Lent holiday. Did you know that in Ecuador they throw water balloons and shaving cream onto perfect strangers? In Brazil, whole towns gather together to be a part of massive parties. In Venice, people come to the town square to show off their creations.

We’ve come up with krewes and have started drawing out our ideas. Can’t wait to start gluing!

Remember to get a ticket for our Mardi Gras party, Fat Tuesday February 21st at Le Poisson Rouge: Buy Tickets here

On Saturday, Culture Club started the day with a very special brunch at Veselka (a neighborhood favorite!). Over pancakes, latkes and eggs mentors and mentees caught up and escaped the cold.

After we had finished our delicious meals we headed uptown to the Bard Graduate Center. We toured the fabulous exhibit, Hats: An Anthology by Stephen Jones. This exhibit was a collaboration between the Victoria and Albert Museum and Stephen Jones (one of the world’s foremost milliners). We saw an unbelievable collection of hats that included a Yankees cap worn by Babe Ruth, a silk bonnet from 1805, and many more. We all left the exhibit with an appreciation for milliners and a desire to start wearing hats!

The perfect way to spend a chilly Monday off from school is to visit a super interesting museum. And the most interesting museum in NYC is The Museum of Natural History. We divided into smaller  groups and went on an excursion for information. Some of us went and visited all the glittery stones in the gems section, some of us walked through the dinosaur bones, some of us learned about the civilizations of our ancestors and some of us visited animals from around the world. We saw butterflies and learned about the moon, the earth and sat in a planetarium (can’t wait to see a movie in The Girls Club planetarium!) Valeria, a member of The CL Program, was our guide and made sure we got to see as much as we could.

This Sunday, the Girls Club, youth from Middle Church, and the Chicago youth theater company For Children By Children (FCBC) joined together to celebrate non-violence on Martin Luther King Day.   FCBC leader Roderick Lewis led a theater workshop exploring his new work, Self-Destruction, about self-destructive behaviors some youth engage in.  In honor of Dr. King’s work promoting non-violence as a radical reaction to injustice, we explored how we could be radically non-violent towards ourselves.

The day was epic.  First, we enjoyed a powerful sermon about our own individual power to change the world led by Senior Minister Jacqui Lewis.  By 11:15am, we could already feel our collective power.

We then got down to theater business.  We played a few ice-breakers, nibbled on Middle Church’s delicious soul food brunch, and ate a few Girls Club Peace Cookies.  Then, we started our fantastic afternoon of reader’s theater.  We read scenes exploring topics such as media representations of youth, violence in schools, the complexities of social networking, and the complexities of teenage romance.  We then led our young adults in discussions exploring each of these issues, asking how they relate to their own lived experiences.  We ended the day sharing our dreams for ourselves in the world.  Our voices have power, and we collectively channeled them for a powerful end to a wonderful day.

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The girls at 3d Street Art Studio are hard at work at their crafting. Using looms they are learning how to make cozy scarves and warm hats. There are yarn balls everywhere!

What better way to kick off the weekend than with some friends and a movie? This Friday, the girls went to see the critically acclaimed film, Pariah. What made the trip even better was that we got to see it with our good friend and girls club supporter Rosario Dawson! It was a fantastic film; the girls couldn’t stop talking about it afterwards. Make sure to catch it while it’s still in theaters!