Oh Happy Day!

December 16, 2013
by Clarissa

Community Getting Involved

I just took my last final today for my Current Issues in Adulthood and Aging class — hip hip hooray! I always have trouble picking from a jillion things to blog about but since it’s a jolly day, I’ll blog about jolly things — the OT Ugly Holiday Sweater Party! As the social chair of OTSC, I always look forward to planning and implementing this event. This event is a young tradition, started only last year, where the students get together and eat, participate in an ugly sweater competition, decorate gingerbread houses and ornaments, and make holiday cards. This year, we held it at the Center for Occupation and Lifestyle Redesign, which is a beautiful Victorian house owned by the USC OS/OT Division. The homey atmosphere, festive decorations, and Christmas tree made the party that much more enjoyable.

It has been so long since we had the opportunity to be creative and do arts and crafts! Participating in crafts reminds me why I so strongly believe in OT — meaningful ways of occupying my time lifts my mood, boost my self-esteem upon product completion, and, since I like doing crafts with other people, increases socialization. Basically, it’s a recipe for well-being. Unfortunately, in the midst of projects, finals, and papers, my creative brain has taken a backseat so it felt great to unwind and create again. On top of that, I was able to catch up with so many classmates and get to know first years. I get lonely with my laptop as my only companion during finals week.

This year, we also teamed up with another student group in our division called Design in Action. They encouraged the students to build gingerbread houses with universal design in mind — they created ramps, grab bars, handrails, and wheelchair accessible doorways. It was a fun way of incorporating some of the principles we learned in class and I loved hearing our classmates’ stories about each house. I was really impressed with some of these houses. Here is the first place winner along with some happy OTs!

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