SU Thinking Day Event

So, if Christmas is to celebrate the birth of Jesus, then Founder's Day (Juliette Gordon Low's birthday) is like Girl Scout Christmas.  With that being said, Thinking Day is to Girl Scouts what Purim is to the Jews (well, not really, but it was the closest analogy I could think of).  Thinking Day is a special Girl Scout holiday where all of us Girl Scouts and Girl Guides pause to remember and celebrate our Scouting/Guiding sisters world wide.

This year our focus countries were Venezuela (that we helped represent), Ireland, Jordan, Pakistan and Malawi.  Seeing as how we are in the middle of the Millennium Challenge, we have also added in the aspect for a focus MDG the past few years.  This year was the twin theme of MDG 4 and 5, reduce infant mortality and improve maternal health.  To make it easier on the troops, we split up the responsibilities   Take for example us and Venezuela.  My troop created the board/presentation.  Another troop made SWAPS and a third troop made food from Venezuela.  A few of the larger troops did all of it for one country or MDG, but most of us teamed up.  It went over fairly well.  We also had a station where the girls could make friendship bracelets to donate to the Sangam's store where they sell them to make money for programs.  We had so many activities, but the best part was in the end, we fulfilled the requirements to earn the WAGGGS Thinking Day patch which the girls can put on the front of their uniform!

Daisies Year 2, Meeting 12

We, GSUSA are a MO (member organization) within WAGGGS (World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts).  WAGGGS currently has four world centers with a fifth in the works.  One of the world centers is our Sangam which is located in Pune, India (to put it in better perspective, it's not too far from Mumbai). The Sangam Friendship Project is an easy project that any troop can do.  They have asked us to send in friendship bracelets. They sell these friendship bracelets to help raise money for things like children's camp and to help raise awareness on various projects, such as Stop the Violence.

Today we worked on the petal friendly and helpful.  We read Sunny's story from the guide book to start us out.  It was a great story on how to make new friends feel welcomed and how to overall be nice.  The girls were feeling a little sluggish, so we played some games.  We didn't initially intend to play games, but it gave us a good in on how to be friendly and helpful to our GS sisters.

Last week when we earned our cookie business leaf, we also talked about places we want to visit in the future (when the girls are old enough).  We mentioned the possibility of visiting one of the world centers, including the Sangam.  What better a way to be friendly and helpful than making friendship bracelets for the Sangam's project?!  We did exactly that.  We had very little time, so made simple bracelets (I don't know the name, but you take 3 pieces, knot one end, twirl it till it's spun up, fold it in half and let it gather up on itself, then knot up the two end pieces).  The girls were told that they could make a bracelet for themselves, one to give a friend, and one to give to the Sangam.  We went over our goal and made plenty extras to send to India, yay!

Next week we'll be earning the My Promise, My Faith pin.