National Girl Scout Cookie Day!

In 1988, I joined Girl Scouts as a precious little Daisy.  Though I had a few years where I was in and out (thank you college travels and high school extra curriculars), somehow, I always ended up back in Scouting.  So here I am, all these years later, still involved in scouting as a leader and a volunteer.

I'm going to get very personal with you right now, but for a good reason.  I am 29, my husband 28.  He is active duty military, so isn't exactly rolling in the dough.  I work part time from home (but let's be honest, I'm not really making much money as well).  But, we own our own home (a nice one), we each have a car (good cars too), and hey guess what- we have NO debt!  We also have several investments and plenty of money in savings.  I admit, we do owe part of this to my husband's penny pinching ways, but I also owe a large part of this too...... GIRL SCOUT COOKIES!

Hear me out though, will you, please?

Goal Setting:

A lot of troops (traditionally speaking) have very ambitious goals!  We want to go to Savannah, Disney (Land and world), we want to go to NYC, England, India and more!  But, all these things cost money, so we need to learn.....

Money Management:

This plays a huge part into our goals, but ultimately, it's very important.  Money is tight in this day and age!  We have to learn about the profits we'll be making, how much things cost, so that plays right back into goals to learn how much we need to sell.  But that even then plays into.....

Business Ethics:
I think the word Ethics speaks for itself.  As Girl Scouts, we promise to live by the Girl Scout law, which in itself is like a code of ethics for Scouts.  All of us Scouts are selling cookies for whatever goal(s) we set.  We learn that we need to respect each other, but at the same time we're supporting each other!  We can't be selfish and hog all the cookies (though what happens with cookies in your house is out of our hands), we all still need to sell them.  But, selling cookies is so important.....

Money management, business ethics, decision making, people skills, and more!

I have a great story about people skills that you all can relate to.....

My precious little Daisy, my daughter, spent the first half of last year's cookie season talking to my butt.  We knocked on neighbors doors, people she KNOWS, yet she still talked to my rear end.  Even one of my closest friend's, whom we have known for years, she asked them to buy cookies while talking to my behind.  Seriously, my bum has never been talked to that much!  And then, booth sales started.  I secretly dreaded it because I was scared she would spend all the the booths talking to my dairy air again.  Much to surprise though, she didn't!  She began to get over her stage fright.  By the end of booth and cookie season, I thought, yay we're finally over the hump!  Now here we are, a year later.  The friends that I mentioned have since moved, so we got on Skype so Leah could ask them to buy cookies.  What did she do you ask?  She hid from the camera and took a good 15 minutes to ask them to buy cookies.  There it was, that secret dread again, as I thought oh boy, I better wear some comfy jeans as we go door to door because my toushy is going to get spoken to again!  The next day, it was bright and shiny out, so we put on our uniforms and hit the streets!  And guess what, SHE DIDN'T TALK TO MY FANNY!  Seriously, y'all have no clue how relieved I was!!!  We start booths here next week, so hopefully she'll do beautifully!

But hey, guess what, this is Girl Scouts,and we love earning badges!  Every level of scouting has special badges for us to earn that relate back to our cookie sales and financial skills.  For those of you who follow my blog know that last year my Daisies earned the Financial Literacy leaves.  They learned very basic money skills. We learned the basics about money, and then we planned a shopping list for the farmer's market when we needed food for another badge.  This year we took our basic knowledge of money and set some troop goals and budgeted for a big trip, which then translated to how much cookies cost, how much profit we make, so how many boxes do we need to sell to achieve our goals.

What else does cookies teach us you ask?  Selflessness.  Though this is something you can't really "teach," you can lead by example.  Many of us have programs in our councils that allow us to donate cookies to our military (quick story- a few years ago during a deployment, my husband remembers an entire palate of cookies being to delivered to where he was at the time).  I told the girls in my troop that I will buy one box of cookies from every scout who shows up at my door (and I have!).  What I did not tell them was that when they come to deliver and I pay for them, I will be donating them back to send off.  I'm hoping that leading by example, they might understand what it means to be selfless.

Oh, but yet there's more to learn.  COOKING SKILLS!  No really.  There are a lot of great recipes out there that use cookies (ok, so they may not be the most healthy things you can eat, but cooking with something fun gets their foot in the door!).  Both the bakers we use have awesome recipes already on their websites:

http://littlebrowniebakers.com/cookies/mmmmm-try-girl-scout-cookies-in-recipes/
http://www.abcsmartcookies.com/recipes

I have tried many of these recipes and can tell you that they are amazing!  They also serve as great marketing tools at cookie booths.  Oh hey, that's yet another thing the girls are learning about, marketing their "business!"

My awesome Daisies just made their booth materials this past week (sorry, I'm behind on posting about my meetings).  I know it's not the best picture, so I'll tell you all about their marketing materials!  They have several recipes featured, they are promoting donating cookies to the military and how selling cookies helps them out.  We haven't finished our goals poster yet (why we're selling them), but it's already off to a good start.



So now, I ask you, what DOESN'T Girl Scout cookies teach our scouts?!  There's so much I haven't mentioned yet!  The learning is literally endless.  Even as an adult, I'm still learning through cookies!

Oh hey, by the way, Girl Scouts are proud members of the 21st century, we've got apps!
For Android phones:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.gsa.gscookiefinder
For iPhones:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/girl-scout-cookie-finder/id593932097?mt=8

Hey, did you know that some of the most successful women in the world were once Girl Scouts?  Hilary and Chelsea Clinton, Katie Couric, Dakota Fanning, Taylor Swift, Serena Williams, Mary Tyler Moore, Abigail Breslin, Gwenyth Paltrow, Lisa Ling, Mariah Carey, Sandra Day O'Connor, Barbara Walters, Sally Ride, Martha Stewart, Lucille Ball, Susan Lucci, Sheryl Crow, Laura Bush, Gloria Steinem..... impressive list, and that doesn't even begin to cover it!  Girl Scout cookies is the LARGEST Girl-led business in the world!  And really, the girls are running it.  Me, the adult, I'm just here to dot the I's and cross the T's (and lift a few heavy boxes).  The girls really do all the hard work and a good portion of the planning.

I felt bad having to tell the girls that according to policy, we couldn't go to Disney just yet (too far), BUT, next year, if they still want to, we'll go when they're Brownies.  I promised them that as their leader, I am open to anything (within reason of course).  My troop is full of ambitious girls, but trust me when I say they are not alone!  Because of scouting, I have literally been around the world.  Because of scouting, I have met some of the most amazing people.  Because of scouting (and my parents), I learned so of the most valuable lessons.......

Because of Girl Scout Cookies, I am where I am today.


So there you have it, Girl Scouting at it's finest..... all because of cookies!

Daisies, Year 2, Meeting 15

Our first meeting back of the new year, yay!  It really stunk being laid up for so long (Mr. Appendix, you will not be missed!), so getting back to Scouts was exactly what the doctor ordered!  Well, not really, he actually ordered me to take it easy, but puh-lease!  Me, take it easy?  If you could hear me laugh, you would have just heard me snort.

The first thing we did today was to help us out with our next meeting.  We were going to begin working on the GAT (global action theme) badge from WAGGGS.  One of the suggested activities was to invite a woman from another country to share her experiences of what it was like growing up/living there.  I personally do not know of any one who currently lives near us, so my solution to the plan was to reach out to the wonderful ladies I met over the summer at Girl's World Forum (and to all those who helped, again, thank you, y'all are AMAZING, as usual!).   I asked the girls to come up with questions for me to email out to everyone.  They came up with some awesome questions!

Where did you live growing up?
What was is like there?
Where do you currently live?
What is it like there?
What special food/foods did you eat growing up?
What is it like being a Girl Guide/Scout in your country?
What is your favorite thing about Girl Guiding/Scouting?
What is a special song or game you sing/play in your country?
If you could visit any place in the world, where would it be and why?
What has been your favorite Guiding/Scouting memory and why?
What was your favorite badge that you earned?

Ok, confession time..... I came up with that last question.  I have an ulterior motive though (you'll see in May why!).

The biggest part of our meeting was beginning work on Responsible For What I Say and Do.  We read Mari's story and discussed ways that we can be responsible.  So, what's a good solution for doing this?  A chore chart!  It's a very simple chart (brush your teeth, make your bed, clean your room, take a bath/shower and a few more along those lines).  We did leave a few blank spots in case parents wanted to add a specific chore, but, the girls have to be diligent every month and every day and do their chores.  At the end of the month, we'll give them a chart for the next month.  BUT, there's another hitch to our plan.  After this, we made money banks.  We took some old jars and covered them with cute paper and decorated them.  We asked the parents to help the girls earn money for their chores, but, it can only be change!  We told the girls that this money they are earning will help them pay for their pins and patches at our end of the year trip to Savannah.  We had to stress that they couldn't ask for more than a quarter per chore (our trip isn't until  May, so this is a great way to help teach them the importance of goal setting and saving money).  Oh, and in case you haven't figure it out, this activity also goes back to our financial literacy leaves we earned last year, so this was a great review!

Daisies Year 2, Meeting 14

Just a few days after meeting 13, my appendix decided it was high time to become a nuisance and burst.  Therefore, what should have been our end of the year meeting ended up being canceled. So instead, I will share with you all what we would have done in case anyone needs any ideas on meetings.

With Christmas around the corner, and the girls being restless to do something downright fun, we thought today would be a great opportunity for that.  But, this being our troop meeting, I couldn't just have a simple fun day, so of course I had to tie in the fun with something Girl Scouty- considerate and caring!  Our plan for the meeting was to read Zinni's story first, and then let the girls make Christmas presents for their family and friends.

It's no secret that we as troops are often hard up for money, so when we do crafting activities, we have to think outside of the box for ways to do amazing things with spending little or no money.  Thankfully, places like Pinterest, Stumbleupon, Crafster and more have great ideas for projects you can do with recycled materials.  Our first idea was to make little table ornaments with toilet paper rolls.  You can either decorate it with construction paper and pipe cleaners, or color them, whichever floats your boat!  Our next idea was to let the girls make whatever they want to make with popsicle sticks.  The most common one I've seen done is reindeer, but you can also make things like stars, Christmas trees, snowmen, toy soldiers and more.  The girls at least had options on what they could do.  Our last option, if we had enough time, was finger printed snowmen on an ornament.  The principle is that you take a simple bulb ornament (a plastic one) and let the girls dip their fingers in white paint.  They then make a whole finger print around the ornament.  Once it's dry, you can decorate with sharpies to give your snowmen the final touches.

We were planning on finishing up our meeting with a patch ceremony.  All of our new girls earned their blue center, plus we had a few journeys, petals and a lot of fun patches to hand out.  I'm a little bummed we had to skip out, but we're having another patch ceremony in the Spring (so we can have all the pomp and circumstance then).

Daisies, Year 2, Meeting 13

When you have a group of first graders, how do you touch on the subject of religion while not offending anyone?  Case in point- within our troop, we represent approximately 6 different religions!

My Promise, My Faith is a pin that a scout can earn every year.  Last year when we introduced it to the girls, we tried touching on all the major religions and tied it all into one big lesson- it doesn't matter what your religion is, they all have the same core beliefs (be nice to everyone, be a good person, ect.).  This year we got a little more specific. The first half of the day we tried relating certain aspects of our religions back to pieces of the Girl Scout law.  We learned that as a whole, the Girl Scout law is represented in all our religions.  After that, we got into our religions and learned about special holidays we celebrate, and why they are so important.

This year's lesson was shorter than last year, but seeing as how it was the follow up, the girls already knew quite a bit.  We finished up by playing a few games and just having some fun!

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.

Daisies, Year 2, Meeting 11

I feel the need to start out this blog by saying I absolutely love the Daisy journey Welcome to the Daisy Flower Garden!  It is the perfect "first thing" for Daisies to do because it introduces them to the world of Girl Scouts.  I think it was so beautifully done and I am so glad we got a chance to do it this year, especially with all of the new girls we had.

Sadly though, we finished up this journey today.  We learned so much from it though, especially with our Take Action project.  The garden is far from done though, and we plan to keep it up as long as we meet at this school.  There was one thing that we did differently to finish this journey.  The end of the story, we see the girls write a letter to future girl scouts.  There is also an activity for us to do that as well.  We will not be doing that activity until the end of our year, and we will be giving it to a new Daisy troop next year.  I thought it would be a great thing for them to do to finish out their year and help them bridge.

Our next item on the agenda was the cookie business leaf.  Earlier this year, the girls decided that they wanted to visit Juliette Gordon Low's house for their end of the year party, so today was a chance to talk about that.  Visiting the house is not free, so the girls need to earn some money to do this!  We looked up how much it would cost per girl (the fee for the program they want to do, their lunch, and patches), how much we earned per box (which isn't that much) and translated it to how many boxes everyone needs to sell.  We also talked about other things we wanted money for, like paying for next year's registration, Brownie uniforms, journey books and more.  In the end, we were able to come up with our goal and make a more concrete list of how we want to spend that money.  It's a great lesson for the girls on basic budgeting, saving and earning money.

Next week we'll be working on a really great project!

Daisies Year 2, Meeting 10

Cookie season is quickly approaching, as is the holidays!  The safety pin is something that all levels have available, and like with all of the "new" Girl Scout curriculum  each level of the pin is appropriate for the age of the girl.  This meeting was a great opportunity for us to not only earn this pin, but learn very important safety points that the girls need to know.

The first thing we learned about was safety points we need to remember while out selling cookies. We learned that we need an adult with us at all times, to never go in someone's house or car, which then lead into stranger danger.  The girls learned what to do in case a stranger approaches them or even tries to take them.
We reminded them to always look before crossing a street and that it's a good idea to hold an adult's hand.  We also learned who is safe to approach in case you get lost, and what to do if you get lost.

Next up, we made first aid kits.  In Target's dollar section near the cosmetics, they had some small kits for 97 cents.  We bought the kits, but then took them apart so that the girls could put them back together later, so they could learn the why.  As we did that, we explained it all.  We also got out a bigger kit and picked it apart so they could learn about other things that might be found in a kit and why.

The next thing we did was to learn about stop drop and roll. This was something they had already learned in school, but we just wanted to reinforce it.  Lastly, we touched on choking.  We demonstrated all the methods (including Heimlich), but stressed to get an adult and what the universal sign for choking is.

We have a cookie rally-sleepover coming up and we're going to be going over these safety points again, plus more for the older girls.  It can never hurt to reinforce these safety points!

Sleepover! AKA, how to do a journey in a day....

The Girl Scout curriculum was carefully designed to go hand in hand with the school curriculum (Common Core Standards).  For example, the financial literacy leaves for the Daisies.  Right about the time we began the first leaf, our girls had already completed learning the basics about money in school.  We then took that concept and expanded upon it.  In other words, that means that each level in scouting is going to be different than the other since it corresponds with school work.  That also means that planning a joint sleepover with a journey is a little tricky, but totally doable with the right planning (good thing I'm a planner!).

The three Daisy journeys introduce the girls to scouting, teach the girls about the basics of traveling, and teach the girls about the importance of caring for animals (and themselves and others).  The three brownie journeys teach the girls about planning and doing a take action project, how to enjoy and conserve water, and how to engage in the world around them through stories and imagination.  In other words, these six journeys are so different!  First step for me was to read (and re-read) all of the Daisy and Brownie journeys.  I also got the leader guides to see if this was even doable.  The leader guides were another must on the reading list.  Those things are often a lifesaver when planning your meetings!  They have so many wonderful ideas, which was great to build upon my planning for this sleepover.

After reading everything, there were a few things that I saw.  The first one was that there were several elements of the journeys that really needed to be done over time, in a troop setting.  Some of the journeys advocate doing a take action project, which is something that really can't be done overnight.  Another aspect is the portions that literally take the scouts on journeys (field trips/outings/camping).  I started comparing the journeys within their categories.  By doing that, I discovered similarities in the It's Your Story- Tell it! aspect.

The three main elements of 5 Flowers, 4 Stories, 3 Cheers for Animals! include caring for animals and yourself (respect myself and others), how to do this, and how to advocate in caring for animals.  The four main elements of A World of Girls are interpreting clues in stories, empowering the girls, advocating for each other and how to reach people all over.  I don't know about you, but once I started with that outline, I thought my head was going to burst.... but it didn't.

The actual logistics of our sleepover were very well planned out ahead of time.  We had a group of older girls who came out to help run this too (and they rocked it!).  The girls were divided into four patrols- two of Brownies, two of Daisies.  Each patrol had a few adults with them, and the older girls manned the journey stations.  Four activities (two Daisy, two Brownie) were done Friday evening, and the remaining four were done Saturday morning.

To start out our sleepover. everyone made terrariums out of recycled bottles.  We told them that once their seeds have sprouted enough, they need to ask an adult to help them transplant it somewhere, then recycle the bottle.  That took care of the Take Action component.  It's not something big and extravagant,  but with 60+ girls there, if only half of them remember to do it, that little bit can make a big difference!

The Daisies were asked to bring a used (empty and cleaned) milk or juice container (the quart size) to make a bird feeder.  Before doing this, they read a passage from the journey book.  On Friday evening, they then got to do a fun activity of making pipe cleaner crafts.  It really didn't have anything to do with the journey, but they did learn to make flower rings, and it was fun.

For the Brownies, we created a "storybook" theme.  We asked the brownies to bring with them an empty cereal box.  On Friday evening, they created their journal.  We gave them a lot of freedom with it, since it's their journal.  The only requirement was that they put several pieces of construction paper in it, and the copies of GS mad libs we made, and decorated it anyway their hearts desired. Next, they read a passage from the journey book and created positivity "globes."  It started out like our Mother's day vases (plastic bottles decoupaged with tissue paper).  Before they finished, they all took small scraps of paper and wrote encouraging words/phrases on them and stored them in the bottles.

It's time for a lesson learned.  After we cleaned up from Friday's activities, we had snack time.  I bought ice cream for the girls.  I thought this would be a good idea because they would get so excited, gobble it up, and then be tired.  Yeah, no.  They were all a little wound up.  We played a movie before bedtime thinking that would calm them down too, but when it was over, at least 90% of them were still up (and it was after 11 when the movie finished!).  I am never serving ice cream at a sleep over ever again!

Saturday morning started out with a bang!  It was something fun, but was also some creative juice to fill the Brownies heads for what they would be doing next.  We gave the girls crazy hair!  They had the choice of getting Cindyloo Whoo hair (Whooville hair) or Pipi Longstocking braids.  The end results were incredible.  I was afraid I would have angry parents calling me later, but I didn't, thank goodness.  The girls hair did give us some great photos though!

Saturday morning, the Daisies learned some basic first aide skills after reading a journey passage.  This didn't take up the entire time slot we had planned, but the smart cookies that they are, the older girls took the groups and used the rest of the time to play games.  Then, the Daisies read another passage from the journey and learned some basic yoga and origami.

The Brownies used their journals all of Saturday morning.  In the first station, they read a passage from the journey, and then paired off to work on the mad libs.  They had six total, and the girls came up with some very funny stories!  For the next activity, the girls were asked to write/draw some comic strips based on what we did at the sleepover, and anything else they wanted to do based on Girl Scouting.  I didn't see all of them, but the girls came up with some awesome stuff.

So, how long did this take you ask?  We arrived for setup at 4 PM, and the girls started coming at 5, with dinner at 6, and activities starting at 7.  Lights out were at 11 PM.  Breakfast on Saturday was at 8 AM, with activities starting by 9 AM, finished up by 11 AM, and then we all cleaned up, telling the parents that pickup was at 11:30 AM.  So yes, you read that correctly- we did two separate journeys in less than 24 hours and did some fun stuff.  It's completely doable, really!  I'm doing this again in the spring for the journeys, so I will tell you all about it then!



If any of you want my plans for this sleepover (and I have it all typed out in details/times), please feel free to email me at troop30426(at)gmail(dot)com and I will be more than happy to send them!  I know that journeys take up a lot of time that we don't always have, and the girls just love sleepovers!

Daisies, Year 2, Meeting 9

Today we worked on the petal courageous and strong.  I love the story in the guidebook that goes with it.  The situation on the playground is something that most of our girls have encountered at some point in time.  It's also a good anti-bullying story.  After we read the passage, we had a discussion about what it meant to be courageous and strong, instances where we've had to be brave, and then launched into a brief manners discussion.  That perfectly lead into our extra special guest speaker!

We are very lucky in that we live in a town that has a military base.  There are veterans everywhere, literally. Last year, my husband came in to talk to the girls. This year his work schedule did not allow it.  However, my friend's did, so he happily came in.  It was very interesting needless to say!  He has two boys who are older than the girls, so trying to explain what he did was interesting.  All of the girls in our troop, except for one, have fathers in the military.  So while he was trying to figure out how to explain his job, we jumped into what does your daddy do, which killed some time.  The girls had some great questions (they always do!).  We had one question about have you ever seen a shark?  To, you push the boat?  It was quite amusing, but I think they learned a lot.  We tied all of this together by asking our guest, are you courageous and strong?  Being the modest man that he is, he didn't want to admit it, but to the girls, doing what he does, he very much is, as is all our brave men and women who are serving.

Our meeting was finished up by writing thank you notes to our lovely guest.  I met up with him later to pass them off and got a chance to read them.  These girls really have embraced the Girl Scouting spirit, and their notes exemplified this!  One cute note even said I love you!

We have more guests coming up, but we've haven't told the girls (shhh it's a surprise!).  After our first guest, I think it's safe to say they will do great with more.

Daisies, Year 2, Meeting 8

Halloween is such an amazing day, but for us Girl Scouts, it's one of our "holy" days.  Why?  Because it's Juliette Gordon Low's birthday!  And, the amazing Juliette loved this because it meant doing extra special stuff on her birthday!

Lucky for us, with our meetings being on Wednesdays, Halloween fell on a meeting day this year.  We invited the girls to wear their costumes to the meeting.  Our first point of business was learning more about our namesake Daisy (for those who don't know Juliette's nickname was Daisy).  Our journey, Welcome to the Daisy Flower Garden, did have a little bit about her, but not a significant amount.  My daughter got a great children's book for her birthday this past year about Daisy, that we read to the girls.  It was like a biography for young kids, and was a great starting point for the girls (as they get older, we'll go more into detail about her life).

Next up, we had a fun craft planned for the girls. We made skeletons from Q-tips, much like this one:


All of their skeletons looked different, and it was great!  I had a big jar of googly eyes in various sizes that the girls got to be creative with.  We had a few cyclops and a few "monsters" thanks to the many eyes.

We finished our meeting with the shoe game.  While this is a great game, I think we might hold off on playing it again until the girls are Brownies.  We had some trouble with the whole multitasking aspect of the game (pass the shoe while singing a song about passing the shoes).  It was a great learning experience though.