By Dakotah West, New York Cares Youth Service Manager

Thinking about designing a mural for the New York Cares Day Students Give Back! Mural Contest? As a judge for our first ever design contest, I’m excited to give teens a new opportunity to share their ideas and thoughts. Apply today and find out where your art will take you.

Once, on a mural painting project, a volunteer painted all the clouds brown when I had my back turned. Flabbergasted, I asked why. “No one told me what color to paint them,” he responded, shrugging. Apparently I needed to work on my communication skills.

Usually, on the day of a project, I sketch the design on the wall like a giant paint-by-numbers coloring book, bring printouts of the mural, and mix hues beforehand. When the volunteers arrive, all they have to do is get the paint from the cups onto the wall – easy peasy.

Looking back, I know why I had a smoggy, brown-cloud mural. Volunteers want to do more than get the paint on the wall – they want to create a thing of beauty, even if they don’t know how. Planning is important, but painting means releasing expectations and having fun.

Sometimes, mistakes can be improvements. At the end of the day, colors seem brighter when they’re painted with joy.

New York Cares Day may seem like the distant future, but we’ve been visiting schools all over the city to plan projects – and they definitely need our help on October 23.

One East New York charter school in its inaugural year is currently totally empty, with white walls, empty shelves, and spotless closets. We hope New York Cares Day volunteers come with paintbrushes swinging when its time to turn this bare canvas into a work of art!

At another school, we found four 25-year-old never-used Atari computers in a storage closet. We can’t wait to get in there to clean and organize the space. If you work at a public school that could use a little love and care this fall, apply now to become a New York Cares Day project site.

Volunteer registration opens on July 20, so check back soon for more details!

The weather forecast couldn’t be better for outdoor projects this weekend. Catch some sun and unwind from the work week on a gardening or painting project in special need of volunteers:

• Garden at Added Value Farms (Brooklyn)
• Spruce Up New Vision Garden (Brooklyn)
• Paint a Fence at Horseshoe Playground (Bronx)
• Paint at Safe Horizon (Queens)

We ordered 822 gallons of paint for Hands On New York Day 2010 (enough to cover more than 80,000 square feet of benches, fences, and park houses with a fresh coat!), and volunteers at Tompkins Square Park are doing their part by painting three miles of fence today.

It’s 8:30 a.m., and Site Captain Linda Blacken has her work cut out for her setting up rakes, paint, gloves, and other supplies for a dozen projects scheduled throughout Astoria Park today. Over 250 Hands On New York Day volunteers are expected at the park within the hour!

We need dozens of volunteers early next week to prime sections of Jersey Barriers along bike paths and pedestrian walk ways in preparation for Hands On New York Day. If you’re free on Monday or Tuesday during the day, sign up now.

During our spring day of service on April 24, volunteers will paint beautiful murals on the barriers, turning them into blocks-long public art projects as part of a collaboration between New York Cares and the Department of Transportation.

Volunteers have been working since January to brighten up I.S. 119 in Glendale, Queens, by painting murals centering around diversity, patriotism, and school spirit.

The murals were completed this weekend after several Saturdays of hard work and many pieces of pizza. Principal Fagan thinks the murals are “absolutely beautiful,” and we do too. Thanks to everyone who pitched in! Check out more photos on Facebook.

Congratulations and thank you to the thousands of caring New Yorkers who took part in New York Cares Day 2009. In just one day they painted hundreds of classrooms and hallways, organized dozens of libraries, painted hundreds of amazing murals, and much more at 117 public schools city-wide.

Thanks to them, on Monday morning more than 88,000 children will find their schools magically transformed into wonderful, vibrant places to learn and grow. They also raised $235,000 in support of our year-round volunteer programs.

Our ED, Gary Bagley, with New York City’s Chief Service Officer, Diahann Billings-Burford, and the New York Cares Day Civic Corps team at P.S. 319 M

As the day draws to a close, volunteers are finishing up some amazing murals at 117 schools. Send in your pictures from the day to blog@newyorkcares.org or post them to our Facebook page, and check back next week to see more of the projects completed on New York Cares Day 2009.

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NY1′s coverage of New York Cares Day in Brooklyn this morning is now online. Watch it here.

Look out for NY1′s interview with Site Captain Sue Craine in Staten Island also. Volunteers came from as far away as Tulsa, OK, to paint murals and plant bulbs at I.S. 49 SI.