BLOOMINGTON- The cool autumn breeze blows by as students file into the buildings of the fine arts plaza.
The ring of the cello player’s instrument fills the halls of the Eskenazi Museum of Art while students and families chat amongst themselves. Snipping’s of felt flutter to the ground as students craft and drink hot chocolate. The final First Thursdays event of the semester has begun, a monthly Fall and Spring event focused on building community amongst students and showcasing different arts and humanities.
“Guys what do we think?”
One student asks another while showing their group their crafted felt fall leaf. Their friends ooh and ah while looking at each other's crafts.
Downstairs different IU clubs share information about their organizations. At the Culture of Care booth, students write what they are most thankful for on a paper leaf that will be added to a drawn tree on a poster board in order to win prizes, while also being informed about the club.
“We’re a student organization that focuses on bystander intervention and caring for other students no matter if we know them or not,” Jess Brown says to the students.
Brown tapes the paper leaves to the board while giving out stress balls, phone wallets, and stickers. Right next to Brown is a table with markers and a giant paper sheet with writing of what participants used to enjoy when they were a kid. This table is for the organization Late Night.
“We host events Friday nights, and they’re just supposed to be kind of like, fun ways to detox from your week,” Dani Headley, member of Late Night, said.
Next door, the scent of Orbit Room hot dogs fills the packed IU auditorium while students line up to see the different activity booths. The most occupied booth? The U Bring Change to Mind booth where students can answer questions about mental health in order to receive highly sought after Labubu toys.
“They wanted to have something that would cause people to really engage with us on the mental health issues and we figured, you know, Labubus’ are such a fun little experience for everybody,” Member of U Bring Change to Mind Katherine Strunk said.
As the sky turns to a midnight blue and the autumn breeze turns into a bone chilling wind, attendees depart the buildings on the plaza. Organizations pack up their booths and discuss how successful they feel the event went for them. Another exciting First Thursday event has officially concluded.