Art in the Park

In our town we have a local group called the Travelers Rest Arts Mission. They host different events in the communities and have classes for adults and children. This past weekend they hosted an event at a local park called "Art in the Park". Kalie and I went with her best friend Hannah (from Girl Scouts). They earned many different parts of try its and had a great time.

Kalie at the Girl Scout booth with Mrs. Barb Green making a necklace.



Kalie and Hannah decorating their banks.



Hannah and Kalie with their painted faces.



Kalie always looks so serious when she is concentrating. LOL!



We had such a fun day. Everything that Hannah made she gave to Kalie and visa-versa. It was so funny.

Girl Scout Camp

We have had a very busy week! Fun, but busy. Kasie is working at Camp Wabak (local girl scout camp) again this summer. She is a natural and does very well!

One of the camps (Sew Glam) for the older girls (grade 7 & above) needed a workshop leader. So Kasie volunteered me! (I am not mad.) I picked a project using recycled jeans. The plan was to come up on Monday and Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday evening for about 2 hours each time.

I was very excited to be working at camp. I LOVE girl scout camp. When the big girls were younger, I was a day camp director for 4 years. It was a wonderful experience! I wish I could give that to Kalie, but camp is set up much differently in this council.

Kalie, Wendy and I spent 2+ hours on Monday and Tuesday at camp with the camper girls. After Tuesday I altered the project (the girls were not getting it). Brooke (a girl in our troop), Kalie and I spent almost 3 hours on Wednesday evening. Wendy, Kalie and I were at camp from 10am until almost 6pm on Thursday. They finished it! WooHoo!

On Thursday we worked from 10:00 until 12:15 with the big girls. We had lunch with all of the campers in the dining hall. So fun! We were able to eat with Luna (Kasie) and her group. Kalie loved it. I hope that she will go to camp for a little bit next year. (Brownie sampler: 3 days 2 nights.)

After lunch Wendy, Kalie and I went back to the administration building to rest and work on projects. The big girls had rest time and another activity . I corrected some mistakes and helped a few girls get further along on their bags.

Buttons (Chris, the camp director) surprised Kalie and Wendy with an invitation for swimming, so off to the pool we went. On our way we had to stop to pet the horses.

Wendy



Kalie



The girls after our swim.



The big girls started working again at 3:30 and finished just in time for dinner! YEA! I wish I could post the pics of the girls and their projects, but the council did not have signed releases for all of the girls. I will post a picture of my finished bag (when it gets finished, LOL!) so you can see what the girls worked on all week.

It was a very busy, eventful week! I LOVED it!

Build A Bear Workshop Party

Our Scouts sold 852 boxes of cookies. Not a lot, but a good number for a new, small troop. The girls choose to spend their profits on a Build A Bear Party! WooHoo! Kalie is the only one who has ever been to BABW. So for the other girls it was a new experience. They had so much fun! I just love these girls!

Katy, Brooke, Hannah, Karin, Kalie and Miss Brittany.



Inspecting their bears.



The heart ceremony. Hayden was unable to come. The girls missed her but made her a bear as a surprise. Miss Brittany had each of the girls and leaders insert a heart into her bunny.



The girls earned the Careers Try It during the party.



Kalie stuffing her scruffy puppy with Miss Brittany.



The girls just LOVED Miss Brittany, she was a wonderful party leader! (I knew she would be, that is why I requested her.) She was very energetic, professional, respectful of the girls and their questions. We had so much fun.



Hannah being goofy, not wanting her picture taken.



Baby Beka (Hannah's little sister) was such a good little girl. She sat quietly in her stroller the entire time. She is going to be a great Daisy Girl Scout in 2 years.



Our troop. Ms. April (me), Ms. Amy (asst. leader), Brooke, Katy, Hannah, Karin, Hayden's Bunny and Kalie.



We ended at Ms. Amy's house. The girls had such a great day!



Katy with her Champ Bear.



Hannah with her Hears for You Bear.



Kalie with her Scruffy Puppy.



Brooke with her Tropical Sun Kissed Hello Kitty.



Karin with her Tropical Sun Kissed Hello Kitty.



We had a GREAT day!

Pizza Inn

Our troop had their "End of the Year" Celebration. For the beginning of the day we went to Pizza Inn. The girls made their own individual pizzas and toured the "kitchen". They LOVED it!



Matt was so great with the girls. He was great with the girls, answering their questions, letting them explore and build their own pizzas.



They loved that we were having pizza for brunch. (The tours are only done at 10:00 in the morning, so we ate at about 10:30.)



Matt, Brooke, Hannah, Katy, Kalie, Karin and Shawn (our favorite waiter) and another kitchen guy (not sure of his name).



This was a great start to our wonderful day!

Court of Awards

Our End of the Year Coart of Awards was a huge success! They girls were very surprised that they had earned so many Try Its and Patches.



The girls sang a few songs and told everyone about their favorite memory of the past year.



Kalie was very excited to have sold 200 boxes of cookies and earn/win her dog.



The girls had worked so hard this year. I am glad that they were able to earn so many recognitions. I think they may work even harder next year. LOL!

Show and Tell Day

Half of our Girl Scout troop is homeschooled. How cool is that! In the Girl Scout organization each troop is set up a little differently. The organization has a framework for leaders to follow but there is pleanty of room for leaders and girls to make each troop their own.

One thing our troop allows, is badge work outside of meetings. The girls are give a form that needs to be completed and turned in. They are also required to bring proof (photo, the completed project, a program or brochure, etc.) to share with the troop. Our plan is to have 3 Show and Tell meetings a year. One at the end of the year (May/June), end of the Summer (August) and one mid year (January). These times match up with our Court of Awards. The COA meeting is usually the next meeting after our show and tell meeting.

As they arrived the girls were given 15 minutes to set up their tables. We began our meeting as usual with the Pledge, Promise, Law and announcements. As leaders, we choose 2 activities (per girl) from the requirement forms as the "shareing" activities. After the group sharing time, we divided the girls into 2 groups with the first group manning their tables and the second group visiting. Halfway through they switched. The girls did a very good job sharing their "talents" and talking in front of a group.

Hannah sharing to Brooke and Kalie.




Karin and Hannah.





Katy explaining to Karin.




Brooke and Katy.

Our troop is small, we now have only 6 girls as we have lost 2 due to behavior expectations. The girls have learned so much this year. They have become a close group of friends. At the beginning of the year Katy and Brooke hardly spoke to anyone and if they did speak you could not hear them. Karin and Kalie were wild and crazy. Hannah was so excited about life and Hayden was happy to be in Girl Scouts again. (She had been a Daisy but could not find space in a Brownie troop when she bridged.) Now they all interact with each other.

The night was GREAT!

Girl Scout Camp

Hannah, Kalie, Karin, Katy, Celeste, Lauren, Hayden & Brooke (L to R)


Here we are ready for our first group activity. We performed a skit about fishing. Everyone loved it and the girls were so cute.



Before breakfast Saturday AM.

After breakfast, playing games in the rain. We were playing Little Sally Walker.

The girls are playing games in Rambler Lodge after our LONG nature/gorp hike.






Here we are Saturday after lunch.

Where have we been?

Wow! It has been a month since I posted. So much has gone on … but mainly we were sick. I will try to recap most of what has happened in our life.

Health ~ Kalie’s allergies are acting up, but that is too expected with the time of year. Kasie caught a “cold” and brought it home to us. I guess because I have been under so much stress lately my immune system is decrease because it turned into walking pneumonia for me. I was pretty much useless for almost 3 weeks. So Kalie has had a very light spring schedule. LOL! We are better now and things are picking up for us. I told Kasie the next time she is sick, she needs to stay at North Greenville. I DO NOT want any more of their germs. I have been sick 4 times since she went to that school. Kalie keeps telling her that she needs to "do college online at home" so we won't be sick.

Girl Scouts ~ Our cookie sale ended with about $350 in profit for the troop. I think that is good since we only have 7 girls. Two weeks ago we had a new girl join the troop, Celeste. She is a friend of Lauren. So we are now up to 5 brownies and 3 juniors. Our service unit is hosting their annual encampment at Camp Wabak on April 18-20. We are so excited! I had a lot of down time when I was sick so I was able to plan lots of stuff. Our end of the year hurrah/cookie sale celebration will be at Build-A-Bear on May 31st. Our awards ceremony will be June 2nd. Our summer plans are almost finished with a meeting every 3 weeks and a field trip or activity once a month.

Izabel ~ She is one wild and crazy dog. We love her to death but she is worse than the cats or the girls. The pets wake me up between 5:30 and 6:30 every morning to be let out. YUCK! I usually am up for the rest of the day after that. We had been letting her sleep with us but she was not very good. She would want to play at about 3:00 am. So now she sleeps in the crate at night. I checked into the AKC. We are going to register her with the AKC but I do not think we will show her. It seemed to me that the “clubs” in our area were a little too high strung for us.

School ~ Kalie has “learned to read”. Yea! A few weeks ago she read her first chapter book all by herself, Junie B. Jones and the Stupid Smelly Bus. She is now reading everything she can, mostly out loud. LOL! So things are changing around here. I am able to give her a little more independent work. When I was sick I had lots of time to veg out, watch TV and read. During that time I was also able to “research” and make decisions for the next school year. We school year round so our new year will begin June 1st. So … I think we will be a little more structured with things and will be adding in new subjects. I am going to try to “hold her back” and keep her in the 2nd grade range. I have thought about this for most of the year and I just do not think it will be a good idea for her to go to college 2 weeks after she turns 18, which is what will happen if she goes to 3rd grade now. I think I might phase in the new stuff one at a time to help with the transitions. We will notebook and lapbook most of our subjects. My plan is:
· Bible - Calvary Chapel (free online) to create our Bible Notebook (this is what we do now and it is working)
· History and Geography - Story of the World 1
· Science - Apologia (deciding between Zoo 1and Astronomy)
· Reading and Language Arts – Learning Language Arts Through Literature (trying to decide on which level to start her in)
· Math - ????? We did a textbook and that did not work well. We tried RightStart but I had the wrong level (too easy) and she hated it, I don’t think she will try the next level. I don’t know if we can afford Math U See, so… any suggestions? We have been playing Math games and using real life math for about 6 weeks now but I know we need something more.
· Art – Next year (September) we will take art lessons from Samantha Bell again. She is wonderful and Kalie loves it! (Not sure what day next year.)
· PE – I hope to be more disciplined and get her to homeschool PE every week. (They meet Mon and Thru, but we usually do Mon.)
· Music – I would love to get her piano lessons, but we would need to get a piano or keyboard so she can practice.
· Girl Scouts – We will continue on Mondays.

WOW! Now that it is all written out it seems like a lot. I am overwhelmed. LOL!

Church ~ We have not been to church in over a month because we have been sick. I am so looking forward to it this weekend! Hopefully we will be able to go to community group also, but that will depend on the older girls work schedule.

Katie and Kasie ~ They are to be finished with exams and will be moving back home April 30th. So, please pray that the transition will go smoothly. Kasie will be working at Girl Scout camp again this summer. She is very excited! Katie is trying to get a job as an overnight resident counselor at Camp Spearhead (special education camp) or the recreation center (day camp).

Well I think that is it. I hope you have enjoyed this recap. LOL!

Saturday ~ I am frozen!

The day was spent selling cookies. We had a booth sale scheduled from 9:00 to 1:00 in the morning and from 4:00 to 8:30 in the evening. This is the last weekend of cookie sales (I am SO glad!) so everything had to be sold.

The morning shift was VERY cold and windy. We sold 22 boxes in 4 hours, not good at all. I was very worried. We did not have enough to even pay our cookie bill. We still had over 170 boxes left to be sold during our evening shift. Well God was shining down on us and answered our prayers. Another troop called and asked if they could have some of our cookies. We were able to transfer 9 cases (108 boxes) to them. So for the evening shift we had about 65 boxes to sell. This was more manageable.

We were able to sell all but 11 boxes. I will bring them to the meeting on Monday and hopefully we can all divide them up to get rid of. I now remember why I was never the cookie mom when my older daughters were younger. It is almost too much to be the troop leader and the cookie mom.

When Kalie and I got home we were so COLD from being in the wind all day that we got into pajamas and went to bed. We did watch TV forever (I was ready to go to sleep by 8:30) though.

Monday ~ Cleaning and Scouts

The day was spent cleaning the house (we did not finish the day before), running errands and a Scout meeting in the evening. Kasie stayed home while we went to Girl Scouts. I came home to Hayley (her friend) and her changing their hair color, AGAIN! Whenever Kasie gets bored, upset, stressed, etc. she changes her hair. I guess I should not be upset, as hair will grow out/back. She could be doing worse things, like piercing and tatoos. I do not always understand my girls. LOL!