One local Girl Scout Cadette has been working on her Silver Award Project for a few months. Elin Lohmann is now hoping that with some advance planning, those planning to attend the Newtown Holiday Festival in a few weeks will help give that project a big boost.

Elin is a member of Girl Scout Troop 50440, based at Newtown Middle School. The seventh grader is one of a few girls in her troop working toward one of the highest awards in Girl Scouting, according to Troop 50440 Co-Leader Natalie DeLaurentis. The two visited the office of The Newtown Bee on November 22, when Elin talked excitedly about the project and its goal.

Girl Scout Silver Award Projects are meant to make a difference in a Scout’s community. They are meant to be measurable, educational, and sustainable, Elin explained during the visit.

Since August, Elin has been collecting supplies for and assembling art kits for distribution to those who cannot afford the supplies, especially those who would like to use the items for art therapy.

She is looking for donations of markers, crayons, colored pencils, glue sticks, watercolor paint sets, safety scissors, stickers, and coloring books.

Donation boxes have been placed at Newtown Youth & Family Services (NYFS), 15 Berkshire Road; and Newtown Community Center, 8 Simpson Street. Items must be new.

In addition to those ongoing collection locations, the public will have the opportunity to make donations and meet the Scout behind the project on Sunday, December 8. From 11 am until 2 pm that day, Elin will have space set up in the alcove near the gymnasium of Edmond Town Hall, 45 Main Street.

She will be set up near the arts and crafts space, NYFS Executive Director Candace Bohr said this week.

“She will be right where kids will be doing crafts, and we all thought this would be a beautiful tie-in,” Bohr said November 26. “We thought this was a good way to highlight the importance of what she is doing.”

Bohr met the young Scout a few months ago, when Elin was still finding the focus of her project.

“She reached out to see if she could do something with us,” said Bohr, who added she was “thrilled” at the idea of working with a Scout going through the steps of a Silver Award Project. “I’m a Girl Scout leader myself, and I have a few girls who are going to begin working on their Silver Awards soon. I’ve been learning from her at the same time.

“She’s very well spoken, and very organized,” Bohr added. “She is a great model of leadership.”

After a few conversations, the idea for the art kits emerged.

Bohr is already among those who see the importance of art therapy. After 12/14, she said, “we’d had donations of trauma informed items — coloring books, journals, scrapbooks and much more, for people who want more than talk therapy.”

With Elin’s art kits, which Bohr said will be available for all ages, clients will be able to do more than talk, if they want to. The kits will be available in the lobby of NYFS as well as within the offices of the mental health clinic’s counselors.

“Our counselors will mention them, and a client can take one if they want,” Bohr said. “Their availability also means it will be easier for our younger clients to access these materials if they want something, but don’t want to tell their parents.

“They may not want to tell their parents they want a journal if the family is financially challenged,” she added. “Children and young adults often don’t want to add stressors to their home life. These kits will allow them to get a journal, or markers, or anything else, without having to ask their parents for something they may not be able to afford.”

Elin’s hope is to help anyone overcome either of those challenges.

“My goal is to make people aware of kids who don’t have the ability to do art, and that art can help kids and people with mental health because it’s a tool to use,” Elin said. “I will make these art kits to spread across the community to everyone, so that if people don’t have enough money to afford art supplies, these will be free and they can take one home.”

She also touched on the same point Bohr made about those who just want to have their own private outlet.

The kits, Elin confirmed, are “for people who might be struggling. They’ll be able to have something to do if they’re stressed out.”

Elin said she had been thinking about what she wanted to do to help others. She enjoys art, she said, and thought combining that love with wanting to help those with mental health challenges “would be a good way to do my project.”

After reaching out to multiple community members, Elin contacted Newtown Youth & Family Services. The youth service bureau and mental health clinic in Sandy Hook was very welcoming to the request.

The agency, said DeLaurentis, “fit the bill perfectly. It brought the art component, the mental health component, and social services all together.”

“Anything would make me happy,” she said of donations. “People don’t have to give me a ton of stuff.

“I’m looking for simple art supplies, anything people can offer.”

Elin has a collection of mesh bags that she is putting the art supplies into. The bags offer an easy way to keep everything together, and carry from place to place.

Her goal is to create at least 100 kits before presenting her final report to the Girl Scout Service Unit, she said.

In addition to the opportunity to meet Elin and drop off a donation during the Newtown Holiday Festival, readers can choose to purchase items and have them shipped directly to Elin (select Tyra Lohmann/Gift Registry Address when checking out). A QR code that will take readers to the online list is included with the photos for this feature.

Copies are also available at the community center and NYFS. It will also be available on December 8, when Elin will have information about her project in addition to a collection box.

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Managing Editor Shannon Hicks can be reached at shannon@thebee.com.