Opening Doors to the Imagination – Texas Children’s Hospital

“In the tree house, there are magic butterflies that spread love.” -Natalie-Jareli

On Wednesday, October 21st, we had the pleasure of revisiting Texas Children’s Hospital for our second creative workshop of the Mural Project. We set up our tables and then walked around the waiting area, asking any children if they wanted to work on an art project with us. As with our first workshop, we had quite a few interested youngsters. After asking the children if they had heard the story of Alice in Wonderland, and telling them the story if they hadn’t, we asked them what they would see in their own wonderlands. Carnival rides, talking cookies, ice castles, and more lay beyond some of these magical doors. One door was even guarded by giant mustached pumpkins.

Because we are temporarily holding onto the children’s art pieces as inspiration for the final mural, we wanted to give them something to take home, too. As they finished their work, we asked each of them to choose a special key from our collection. Each magical key, strung onto a necklace, is a reminder to its holder to open the door to his or her imagination. It is an invaluable moment to see the faces of these children light up with joy, realizing that they have a world of endless possibility inside of them, as long as the door of creativity is unlocked.