Look at what you have!

Apparently I have lots of miniatures around my house that I have collected over the years. Its not as though I have a collection, I just tend to get things and keep them. Years ago I had a nice bunch of furntiture and miniatures, and I gave many of them away to a relative. So, I am always surprised when I find I have anything small still.

Of course having a child is going to pretty much provide you with a bunch of toys and miniatures. Barbies tiny cookware, tea sets and foods I knew back when my daughter was very young that I would one day be a play therapist .. so there were things I held on to..even though I didn't know why!

Today though I am working on a doll house. I was making this as just another doll house for my practice. I have made doll houses with my clients before so I had extra kits of homes and furniture. I decided that building this house this would be my therapy over the 4th of July holiday.

So as I was finishing up today, I went searching for a tiny stained glass lamp I had years ago, that I thought may be up in my office. I was stretching and reaching into a box and found this tiny package. I was a tad blown away.. it is 6 fake bottles of hard liquor! each one comes in a box, and each bottle is filled with something so it looks like it has liquor in it!. What a great find for my sandtray! 

Sand Trays

This is a photo of one of my new sand trays. Fortunate to have a patient and handy husband, he also built me one a few years back that I no longer have access too.. but its a beauty.

This one is a tad different, the inside is painted blue (for sky and water) and he made a leg stand to hold the tray which it simply lifts out of. The legs have casters so I can roll it around... which I do. When you combine that with a pedestal chair with wheels you can get in and around the sand so much better, spin the tray, spin the chair!

I like the legs rustic looking.. I plan to add a small shelf on the bottom later. This tray is smaller than the traditional tray. I need to keep my tools very portable as I sublet space whenever possible. My other tray is full size, and very difficult to bring around. I also use real sand now, the moonsand (which I have a recipe for) sometimes seems too odd, but it molds really well and is fun to play with ... however.. real sand always feels great!

That first post.... miniatures

This first post is about making things. I have collected many toys and things for my practice over the past few years. I select my toys with great care, depending on how they are to be used, what they may symbolize. But I think its important to include hand crafted items when possible.

Of course I have many store bought toys, but my practice is a place where children (and adults) will find uniqueness and a sacred space that will allow them to bring unconscious feelings and emotions to a place where they can be processed, and let healing begin. So having hand crafted items bring in elements of un-perfection, creativity, and uniqueness.

This first items I am showing are of tiny houses I made for my sand tray. Sand tray is like a tiny world, so everything in the world really belongs in it!

I also have store bought houses I have collected... I will show you those later. These tiny simple houses are made of wood and painted with acrylic.

As you can see on the left there are city buildings. They represent the World Trade centers, and they do not look damaged in person as they may do in the picture.  I feel they are essential to my sand tray being as I live in NY and many here are still very much impacted by their destruction. The scale is different from the houses, of course because they need to be, but scale is not as essential in this sand tray as having something available.