Friday, May 15, 2015

Closing out the year

On Monday we talked a little bit about our experiences over the weekend.  Then we did some planning for the rest of the year.  Here is the proposed schedule for the rest of this school year:

5/18:  The girls wanted time to just play, so, on this day we are going to make cookies (with left over oatmeal from camping), and then free play.   We hope to be able to pass out the cookie rewards at this time, too.

5/25:  This is Memorial Day, and thus No School, and thus No Girl Scouts.

6/1:  The girls have decided to have an art show.  This will allow them to finish the Painting badge.  Each girl should bring in some art work to show.  They voted that it can be personal work, or pictures from favorite paintings done by professional artists.  Any pictures are allowable, but, not artwork such as sculptures.
We will put together the show, talk about what is inspiring in the artwork, and serve cookies.  ;)

6/8:  This day is the spring concert for 2nd graders currently taking music.  We will mostly take the day for free-play.  We will also bring the girls back to school for the concert, and parents can meet us at the school.  We will propose a final schedule for this when we see what the final schedule for the concert is.

6/14:  I believe Laural has sent you all email to save the date for a pony related end-of-year party.

6/15:  This is the last Monday of school.  The girls want to have an invention day, so they can finish out the inventors badge.    In order to do this day, we'll spend the next few weeks collecting paper-towel and toilet-paper tubes, cardboard, string... anything that can be used to craft an invention.

I can't believe how close we are to the end of the year.  On the last day of this year we should be able to give each girl a painting badge, a snack badge, and an inventor's badge.   I feel like it has been a productive year, and hopefully we have met our goal of giving the girls more big projects and more fun in Girl Scouting.

Looking forward - I am incredibly grateful that you are willing to share your girls with me.  I think each of these girls is really special, and I'm happy to have them in the troop.  Martha and I have been thinking about how we will proceed next year, and I will be writing that up soon.  We do hope to continue the troop, and we hope that all of our girls will choose to stay.  We will be splitting the two schools into two different troops, and we will welcome any Lincoln girls who wish to join the Lincoln patrol.


Sunday, May 10, 2015

Encamporee

Yay!  Camping.  It happened, our girls did it.  Many boxes of cookies, a lot of taking, and one or two friendly hugs for girls who were unsure, but they thrived and had what I hope was a wonderful weekend.


Obviously, our first night involved S'Mores.  Because.  What a beautiful night to be out in the woods around a campfire.


Miss Martha read the girls stories every night before bed.  The girls really dug their big rooms, with bunk beds, and lots of friends.  The did sleep, at least a little.


The girls woke up fairly early on Saturday, and we were the first troop to breakfast.  This did mean we had some time to spare.  Here are the girls saying 'Good morning, Mom and Dad!' (except I couldn't find my email list to send it).



 The weather was really nice, which makes camping life easy.  We waited for opening cermonies in the sun, and all the girls got to enjoy Saturday activity in the sun.

Not pictured on this day, our girls helped a Daisy troop bridge to Brownies, by talking to them about Brownies, teaching a couple of songs, and doing a craft with them.  Pretty much everyone agreed that this was a high-light of the weekend, and I think it is a great example of what a great community scouting can be.

We were also lucky that, on Saturday night, our 'big sister' troop (well, a troop with some of our girls' big sisters in it, who helped us bridge to Brownies last year) came by for our fire in the evening.  They were really great leading songs and eating marshmallow treats and 'being a sister' to all of our Girl Scouts.  Thanks, Guys!!

Of course, we couldn't have done it without these awesome girls.  I, personally, am grateful that our girls have their leadership team.  (Some of whom were inside shushing whispers instead of getting photographed.)


I'd love to hear more feedback from your girls, and a pictures if you have them...

The girls have already agreed that we're going back next year!