We had so much fun partnering with Laura! She is so sweet and talented. Everyone who was able to get their portrait painted loved it and it definitely added value to an already established event in the neighborhood. We had a decent amount of new neighbors show up to the event and we are pretty confident that it was because of the artist collaboration. What we learned was the portraits aren’t 5 minutes. We thought 20-25 portraits would get painted in the 2 hours but it was more like 10 (multiple people in a portrait). We had a few people who didn’t hang around because it was hot and there was a decent amount of people on the waitlist and some who didn’t get painted because the event ended. Laura needs to double herself! We are super proud that word spread as far as it did (we had some non-neighborhood attendees who found out about it, which is still baffling but we don’t turn anyone away). Laura was also able to share with interested neighbors where they could find her at other events which was super encouraging that they valued her talents. We loved seeing neighbors mingling and chatting all over our front yard, introducing themselves to each other and catching up with people they knew. We also loved that some neighbors got a momento of the day and hope it reminds them that community is worth it! We also loved that one of our neighbors was celebrating their golden anniversary and now have a portrait to commemorate this milestone. We loved collaborating with Laura and seeing her talents put a smile on people’s faces. And we loved that she chatted with people as she painted their portraits, helping our efforts in seeing the people who showed up. Our goal is that they walked away feeling seen!

Here’s a link to all the photos we took at the event or neighbors shared with us: https://photos.app.goo.gl/GyADZy2oBKEuaBZM9

We already have plans for upcoming events that we could advertise for at this event. Our next big one is a community-wide yard sale. We will continue Pancake Saturdays one Saturday a month in hopes of drawing out the same and new neighbors. We host a quarterly Bingo which is on the books and are excited to request some more artist collaborations for the neighborhood. Neighbors voted at last month’s Pancakes and the Fairy Artist (April?) was one of our top votes. We are really grateful for this grant!! As a member of a neighborhood association that is rebuilding itself from the ground up, and as a husband and wife team who is passionate about being community builders neither of these have a budget and we depend on donations from the neighborhood to keep these events happening. So, this grant has allowed us to make a bigger impact in bringing people together.