Month #7 -- Earning our Violet Petals

To earn our violet petals, my girls made a pen pal kit to send to our sister daisy troop in Kentucky. You may remember from previous blog entries that I met another beginning troop leader on Facebook who is from Kentucky -- the same town I lived in for 4 years before coming to South Dakota. We gathered a few things and sent them off to Kentucky to show our sister scouts what South Dakota is like. Our first item was a letter from myself to their troop. Here is the text:
Dear Troop 730,

Hi! My name is Sarah, I am the troop leader for Daisy Troop 50382 in Watertown, South Dakota. There are 9 girls in our troop, they are all in kindergarten. We are learning many new things in Girl Scouts this year. We have participated in a SWAP, we made cookies for “Love Our Community” Day and we just visited the fire station to earn our Red Petals.
We are excited to learn about Kentucky. Most of the girls in our troop have never been to Kentucky but my daughter S was born there! My family lived in Danville for 4 and ½ years. My husband worked at a local manufacturing company, I worked at a local veterinary hospital and we went to church at Centenary United Methodist.
We are enclosing a few things to help you learn about our town and our state. Watertown has some really great ways to keep kids busy. We have a zoo, a big library, a water park and an opera house that gets educational displays like dinosaur fossils. We also thought you might like some of our SWAPs!
Thank you so much for being our Sister-Troop and for helping us to learn how to be a sister to every Girl Scout!

The next item included in the pen pal pack was a picture drawn by each of my scouts of their favorite thing to do here in Watertown. Everyone drew swimming! I think it was a hint that the girls were sick of winter. Each girl signed the Pen Pal letter as well. We included enough of our SWAPs for each girl in their troop and a map/tourist information on Watertown. We are excitedly waiting their letter!

Month #6 -- Earning our Orange Petals

I apologize, I missed a meeting in my blog entries! This should have been between the first cookie shop entry and the end of cookie sales.
Cookie sales gave us a nice opportunity to teach the girls about being responsible. During our March meeting we went over the basics of how to behave at the cookie shops. We talked about the rules and asked the girls for their ideas. Then we set up a mock cookie shop and I pretended to be the Girl Scout selling cookies. Becke was the customer. We showed the girls that they must speak politely to the customer if they want to sell cookies. We also showed the girls possible scenarios they might encounter at cookie shops. We discussed things like:
1. Speaking clearly to customers
2. Answering questions for the customers and not being afraid to ask Mom, Dad or the troop leaders for help.
3. Never following a customer to their car.
4. Always saying thank-you after speaking to a customer, even if they don't buy cookies from us.
Our goal was to help the girls be responsible for their own words and actions. I think it worked pretty well. We also talked with them about listening to the volunteer Moms, Dads & the troop leaders when we are selling in public. People might not want to buy cookies from a Girl Scout who does not respect authority, so we were able to sneak in an early lesson towards our Purple and Magenta petals.

We survived cookie sales!!

I must say I am very excited to report that we made it through cookie sales and we did great! The girls did great individually and as a whole the troop sold 1764 boxes of cookies!! The girls each reached their personal goals and most went beyond that. Our cookie shops went well, thanks to being allowed to set up indoors. South Dakota doesn't have the most predictable weather, and it was cold and windy most of the days we were selling. We finished up with 21 extra boxes of cookies, not bad at all considering 8 have already been requested by troop moms! The girls earned so much money that we are "celebrating" by going on a buffalo adventure! It's actually a Girl Scouts event, but I am hoping my whole troop can go. It will be our first event out of town. Here is the link: The Possibility Farm
I am excited, with the cookie money we can afford to do some fun projects, camps and get patches! I love my troop a whole lot, I am so glad I decided to be a leader!

Our First Cookie Shop!

I am so proud of how well my troop has done selling cookies this year. For a small troop of first-year Girl Scouts, they did great! Most of the girls reached their goals and all of the girls earned the basic cookie patch. Our cookies came in last week and we have been delivering ever since. Today was our first cookie shop at a local truck stop. We are very thankful to the truck stop because they have allowed us to set up or table inside -- out of the rain and cold -- and they have agreed to let us have 5 cookie shops over the course of the month. The cookie shops are broken up into 2 hour shifts. Saturdays from 9-11am, 11-1pm and Sundays 1-3pm. I asked the girls' parents to committ to 2 cookie shop shifts. The girls who have signed up are asked to work their shift with one of their parents. I am there as well. The girls also know they can work extra shifts to earn more incentives, since some were close to big prizes but just not quite there.
Today was hard at first because the girls were wound up and giggly. But at the end of our day we had sold 73 boxes of cookies. Becke, my assistant, and I have talked and we would like to spend some time at our next meeting learning how to behave at cookie shops. We'd like the girls to be more willing to ask people to buy cookies and to prepare the peoples' orders. Moms should just be there to supervise and make sure people are given the correct change. Overall, it went well and we're excited for next weekend.

Month #5 -- Earning our Red Petals

We have had many opportunities to earn our red petals for being courageous and strong. The girls attended "Animal Yoga" in December to earn this patch as well as learning new exercises for their homework this past month. As an extra opportunity to try new things, I brought a hula hoop, a jump rope and an ankle skipping toy (sorry, I don't remember what it is called.) The girls enjoyed trying to hula hoop, though only a few were "pros", and jumping rope was by far the most popular activity. None of the girls was able to figure out the skipping toy, but everyone gave it a try. Our most recent opportunity to work on this petal was a trip to the fire station. We talked with Firefighter Troy about fire safety and how to be courageous and smart during a fire. The girls got a chance to walk through an ambulance and the big ladder truck! (Pictures to come, I promise!) We really enjoyed ourselves and learned a lot. At our next meeting the girls will be making a thank you card for the firefighters who talked with us.
Our craft project for the month was to make bead-ballerinas. The girls used beads, pipe-cleaners and paper muffin cups to make their ballerinas. We talked about being physcially strong and practicing a lot to learn skills like ballet, gymnastics, swimming and other sports.
To start the girls thinking about their next petal, Orange for Responsible for What I Say and Do, I read the girls some short stories from a book called, I Did It, I'm Sorry. The girls were given a set of multiple choices of how to correctly handle each situation, for example when something gets broken at home. I asked the girls to remember these lessons for the next month and try very hard to admit when they had done something wrong. I also asked them to remember to follow rules like wearing seatbelts.

Time to sell some cookies!

The girls are very excited for cookie sales, and they can officially start today. We had a cookie rally a few weeks ago and the girls who were able to attend had a ton of fun! I helped with putting the girls' pictures on their own box of cookies. At our last meeting I went over all the rules of the cookie sales with the parents but I did not hand out the forms, since it was over a week before our sales could start. Our council has set the rule that early sales would result in the entire troop losing it's proceeds, so my assistant and I felt it was better to be safe than sorry. We discussed earning a badge by taking an online safety quiz and about our goals for this sale. I also asked the parents about ideas for locations for Cookie sales in the community. We had lots of great ideas and I am hoping that we will be able to set up a table indoors since the weather here is still so cold!

Month #4 -- Earning our Light Green Petals

This month we needed to talk about earning our Light Green petals as well as prepare for our Red petals. Two of the girls in the troop missed the meeting in December, so I decided to read a story to the girls that had lessons about being considerate and caring as well as being brave and strong. I felt that the fable The Lion and the Mouse would fit perfectly. I started out by asking if the Lion was brave and strong, the girls agreed, but they also agreed that he didn't have to be nice to anyone if he didn't want to, since he is the king of the jungle. They thought the Mouse might be caring but since mice always run away and hide, they aren't very brave. At the end of the story the girls saw that the Lion had tried being considerate and caring and the Mouse had found courage. To back up the lesson, I created a bookmark as our craft. The girls colored and cut out the bookmark. When the bookmark is closed the Lion says, "I can be considerate and caring" and the mouse sits at his feet. When the mouse is pulled down, the message "and I can be courageous and brave." apears. Click here if you for the PDF would like to use this craft. For homework I asked the girls to find a new exercise to learn, reminding them that exercise makes their bodies strong. For example, Sammi wants to learn to hula hoop.