Brownies

Our new Girl Scout year is now underway.  Savannah bridged at the end of last year from Daisies to Brownies.  Lots of exciting and fun things are in store for our troop this year.  We are ready to take the Brownie world by storm.  Savannah is especially excited about her new vest.  She looks so grown up and official in it; all the girls do.  They sure have come a long way in the last two years.

Yes, Dolls Need Sashes Too. Duh.

Any parent out there with a little girl who is Savannah's age (give or take a few years) can totally relate to the American Girl Doll obsession.  Now imagine that not only do you have your little girl who is cuckoo for her doll, but also a whole troop of adorable little girls who love their dolls too.  Yup, I have my hands full of doll obsessed little sweeties... and since these little girls have absolutely blown me away this past year and exceeded most all of my Girl Scouting expectations, I decided to surprise them with something extra special at our troop's end of the year party.  Way back last fall when our troop was formed and I gave out the girls' sashes they asked (almost immediately) if I could make a matching one for their doll.  I said yes, and honestly intended to, but then things started to pick up and our troop was crazy busy and I just had very little time.  Well, I finally made time... and let me say, I am so happy that I did.  These mini me sashes turned out fantastic!  They were super easy to make and the look on the face of those girls was priceless.  

I was so impressed with the final product that I made Alice model her new sash so I could share.

My favorite part... the patches on the back.  I found images of some of the patches that the girls earned this past year and printed those out for their dolls' sash.  I am planning on surprising them with additional patches for their doll over the next year.

Troop 3518 all together for one last meeting/party before we break for the summer.  I am really looking forward to another year with these little ones.

Adventures In Girl Scout Camping: Day Two

Now that we know the girls are totally comfortable and capable of spending the night at a campground without parents, further camping trips will be planned for an entire weekend.  For this trip the girls arrived Saturday at 10am and left Sunday at 1pm.  So we had a little more than a 24 hour period to squeeze in everything we wanted to.  Next time I would love for them to arrive Friday late afternoon/evening and maybe stay an hour or two later on Sunday.  That way we would have plenty of time to do all the activities we wanted.  Sunday (day two) was pretty full.  The girls woke up at around 7am... they got dressed, ate breakfast, and then packed up their belongings.  We did a morning craft and a science experiment as our first activities of the day.  For their craft the girls gathered sticks and other items they wanted to hang from them so that we could make a nature wind chime.  For science they broke up into teams and dug holes big enough for plastic bottles to fit in and then made volcanoes.  They had a blast with that.

Their completed wind chimes.  They turned out way cuter than I expected.  Savannah's has been hanging on our back porch since we got home.

Savannah and another girl working together to attach things to their wind chimes.  Gotta love teamwork.

Savannah and her buddy Jaley.  These two also play softball together.  

After craft/science time we had a snack and then headed out to meet the park ranger for a guided hike.  This was my favorite part of our Sunday.  Our guide was awesome... she had so much knowledge to share about the wildlife and plant life at Cedar Hill.  The girls (and the adults) were in total awe of her.  She was pretty fantastic.

Throughout the tour our guide would stop and pull teaching props out of her backpack.  We kept joking around and calling it the Mary Poppins bag because it wasn't that big and she was pulling out a never ending supply of stuff.  The girls loved the animal skins/furs that she pulled out for them to feel.  She had a coyote, bobcat, opossum, rabbit, fox, and two others I can't remember stuffed in her bag.  They were pretty awesome.

Last picture of the trip... the girls with their camping patches.  They more than earned them.  So proud of these girls and how well they did away from their parents and how well they listened to us and how well they worked together.  I would take this bunch camping again in a heartbeat.

Adventures In Girl Scout Camping : Day One

Our troop's weekend camping trip is now officially in the books.  It was an insane amount of work, but totally worth it in the end.  The girls had a fantastic time... they were very expressive of how much fun they had and the girls that I have seen at Savannah's school this week have already asked me if I will take them camping again.  Does it get any better than that?  I think not.  Most of these girls had never gone camping before, some of them had never even been hiking or done anything outdoorsy like that.  So my number one goal for this trip was to give them several different camping "traditional" camping experiences so they could see how much fun camping can be.  Goal number two... for these girls to see that camping can be done without daddy or other males.  The Girl Scouts theme for the 2013 year is "Girls Can Do Anything"... I am a huge believer of this sentiment.  I wanted to make sure that our chaperones were moms (or other women), that the girls saw us moms setting tents up, starting fires, cooking food, leading hikes, and all that good stuff.  I love that the patch they earned at the end of the trip says "Camp Like A Girl" on it.  Our troop totally rocked the camping like a girl thing.  We had a great time, and if I'm being honest, we looked good doing it!

The girls thought the tents were the BEST thing ever.  They were immediately obsessed and excited about the idea of getting to sleep in the tent.  Our entire troop (minus one girl who had to leave) successfully slept the whole night with no issues in tents.  This is a huge deal for a group of six year olds who haven't spent many nights (if any) away from their parents.

My favorite activity the first day was the nature scavenger hunt that we planned for the girls.  We split them up into three teams... each girl had a bag and a list of twenty things to find.   They had two hours to go and explore and find the things on their list.  First team to meet back at the campsite with each girls' list complete would be the winner.  My little team of girls had a blast finding everything on the list.  They were all so enthusiastic about each thing they found and placed in their bag.  

Savannah's BFF Olivia joined our troop a few months back.  Savannah and her are the sweetest little girls... they worked together on the scavenger hunt and helped each other do things.  It was so awesome to see real friendship like that.

I would have to say that the girls' second favorite thing (behind the tents, of course) about our camping trip would have to be the bug catchers that I brought for them.  They picked up bugs for hours and hours.  At one point I had to take the bug catchers away from them just to get their attention.  Who would have thought that ten little girls would be so crazy for bugs.

After we were done with the scavenger hunt we took a quick break, ate a snack, and then headed out to hear a park ranger speak about the reptiles that lived at the park we were staying at.  I was so impressed with Cedar Hill State Park and the numerous FREE educational programs they offered to us.  The ranger even had a snake that the girls were able to pet.  Awesome.

When we got back to the campsite parents began showing up for family dinner.  Since a lot of the parents were so hesitant about letting their daughter go camping without them, we offered up a time for them to come up and eat dinner with us, scope out our camping situation, and then leave.  The girls roasted hotdogs over the campfire... which they thought was pretty dang cool.

Once the parents were all gone we busted out the good stuff.  S'mores!!  It's not camping if you don;t roast a marshmallow.

After S'mores we sat around the campfire and went around the circle telling our highs and lows of the day... then we told a few stories, read a couple camping books, and then headed off to our tents for night night.

The group shot from the weekend... me and my co-leader, our two chaperones, and our ten awesome little girls.  Seriously a good day.

Girl Scouts Day At The Ballpark

I didn't mention it in my previous post, but the reason we went to last night's Rangers game was because it was Girl Scouts day at the ballpark.  In honor of that event, local troops were invited to participate in a pre-game parade on the field.  A few of Savannah's troop members joined us for the fun.    They were all pretty excited to get to walk on the field.  I tried to take as many pictures of them down there as I could, but those field ushers are strict.  Every time I stopped to take a picture one of the ushers was right there to tell me to keep it moving.  Despite that, it was still fun for them and me.  Girl Scouts has been pretty awesome to us so far!

Eric and Ryder were up in the seats watching us go by... this is the best picture he got with his phone.  I went ahead and added arrows so you can spot us.

Insta-Friday

One of the longest and busiest weeks to date.  Eric did work from home this week, so it was nice to have the extra set of hand around the house.

Monday night was our troop's cookie sale wrap party.  We held it at a local bounce house place... the girls loved this idea.  Once we were done with pizza and the handing out of awards, the girls got to go bounce for nearly two hours.  That is kid heaven.  At our party, our troop's top seller was announced... I am very happy to share that our very own Savannah was the top seller.  Her grand total was 774 boxes sold!!!  Awesome!!

Ryder's most favorite character is Jake of Jake and the Neverland Pirates.  So naturally anything he sees with Jake on it appeals to him.  At the grocery store this week, Ryder saw this bag of chips with Jake on it.  He started pointing and saying "Jake, Jake, Jake".  When I told him that he couldn't have those he freaked out.  Tears, tears, and more tears.  Fits normally don't phase me... but when the fit is happening because he is too young to understand how dangerous the chips he was begging for are for him... now that makes me sad.  His allergies suck and are becoming more and more challenging.

Tuesday I took Ryder to the doctor because he was wheezing and coughing really badly.  I could tell that he was having some trouble breathing.  He was prescribed a steroid and out on breathing treatments three times a day.  Boo.

Egg dyeing success.  Both kids had fun... Savannah more than Ryder.  She is finally old enough to decorate and color the eggs properly.  Ryder, on the other hand, just wanted to drop them in the dye and then take them out and drop them back in the dye... he could have done this over and over and over again.

Like I mentioned above, Jake is his favorite.  So of course we dyed some Jake eggs.  Big sister helped put them together for her little brother.