About 10 people gathered in the LGBT Center to make colorful crafts and pins for the National Trans Day of Remembrance Vigil on Friday.
The Ohio University LGBT Center got even more colorful Friday.
About 10 people gathered in the center’s main room to knit rainbow garlands, to color pictures and to make beaded pins.
The crafternoon served as an opportunity for people to wind down from a stressful few weeks, said delfin bautista, director of the LGBT Center.
“Folks just like coloring,” bautista, who uses they/them pronouns and the lowercase spelling of their name prefers, said. “It’s therapeutic. These last few weeks have been tough on a lot of folks with midterms and exams, so it’s just an opportunity to color and be silly for a little bit.”
Camry Carey, a junior studying criminology and sociology, worked on a garland to hang in the space separating bautista’s office from the center.
“We’re making stuff for the doorway … We’re just going to see what happens,” Carey said. “Hopefully, it looks amazing.”
The garlands will allow bautista privacy to focus in their office, bautista said, but without having to shut the door. Additionally, they said, it will add more color to the center.
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bautista also worked on making pins to have during the National Trans Day of Remembrance Vigil, which is being held on Nov. 19. The pins are decorated with blue, pink and white beads to represent the transgender flag, and bautista also made pins of different colors to represent various versions of the gender queer flag.
“Folks tend to take the pins, and some people will have them on their book bag and wear them,” bautista said. “It’s a way of showing solidarity to the trans community, especially in response to a lot of the violence that we’re seeing … letting trans folks know that there are allies who support them.”
Nina Richner, an undecided freshman, worked on the rainbow garlands and said at the end of the event that they turned out great.
“In the past couple weeks, I’ve been really busy … I felt bad because I haven’t been coming to the center,” Richner said. “It was a great opportunity to be social with people that I haven’t been hanging out with as much. I just really like the LGBT Center.”
@rachel_hartwick
