Meeting Happenings: AN ENGLISH SISTER TROOP!!! by Selina

12/6/13
Hello everyone!
It's Selina and here's an update!
Last Friday night we had a meeting.

Food
We had delicious, mouth-popping Mexican food from Frontera, courtesy of Mrs. Donna and Brittany! Dessert was this beautiful winter themed cake with the man from Cake Boss adorning the box, which apparently was all that he adorned, since the taste was a bit of a disappointment to the buds!

Meeting
Professional photos: Lately we have been trying to get some professional photos done for our whole troop, but since funds are still running low, we were hoping to find a place that could give us a discount or even a free session including copyrights to the photos. The nice folks at Portrait Innovations from the Avenue are willing to do all this for a little more than $100 bucks. This will probably be our best option.

The Surprise!: All right, as you have no doubt read in the title, here comes the special surprise of the meeting...:

We've found sisters in England!!

On Friday night, Mrs. Susan broke the news to us! Our sister Girl Scout troop, or Girl Guides as they call it, are located in a cute place near London. They all seem to super energetic and hopefully just as ecstatic as we are over here! We got to read some of the letters they sent us and respond  to them with our one. There was a lot that we had in common! I absolutely can't wait to meet them in person, it will make this trip just a whale size more special!

England: Well, other than the amazing sister trip news, England team brought us more info on transportation with the Tube. Apparently, you can get on for free if you are a student, but we are not sure if an American student would count. Still looking into that!

Iceland: We found more info on transportation and activities we could do. Brittany found some good restaurants that we were told to DEFINITELY check out. (Including a very well known hot dog stand that serves LAMB hot dogs!)

Over the past few months, we have been increasing our vocabulary in some Icelandic words. We ran out of time to learn new Icelandic words this time, but here are the words that we have learned so far!

1. Yes - Jai
2. No - Nei
3. Hello - Hallo
4. Goodbye - Bless
5. Thank you - Takk fyrir
6. My name is... - Eg heiti...
7. I'm from... - Eg er fra
8. What's your name? - Havo heitir pu?
9. Sorry - Eg bid st afsokunar
10. How are you? - havo segrou gott?
11. I'm good, and you? - Allt gott, en pu?
12. Just fine, thanks - Baro fint, takk

That is all for this week!
New posts are coming up soon!

Takk fyrir en Bless Bless!!!!

Selina :)

Meeting Happenings by Emma

Hey Guys,

Emma here.  Tonight I'm going to explain a little bit about what happens during our troop meetings. Each meeting one girl's family is assigned to make the whole troop dinner. Now we have 9 people and that might not seem like a lot, but when you're growing and eating like elephants, can you really be blamed? Anyways, the first few people who arrive help Rosie and I set up the table. That includes putting in the extra boards {to make the table longer}, putting a table cloth on, silverware, napkins, drinks, and, of course, to set the mood, light a few candles.  At the same time, we have two girls go to the creepy, dark basement and get the white board.

After everyone arrives, we help put the food on the table and sit down to eat. It's always very delicious! A custom we have all gotten used to is when Selina brings diner there's always a... surprise. She's brought octopus, fish head, duck's foot, pig blood, goose egg, and every time, they've had an acquired taste. Ah, Selina, you never fail us.

During dinner we share stories, have laughs and enjoy each other's company. When everyone has finished their meals, we start the clean up. Everyone takes their own plates into the kitchen and then just helps making everything go back to normal.

We then go into the den and begin the meeting.  Usually, we start with an opening, sometimes we say highs and lows of our week or what we're looking forward to during the weekend.  We have a Troop President who leads the meeting, and every girl has a leadership responsibility in the troop.  We run the meetings but sometimes get a little off track, so our Troop President has to keep us going. 

After we go through everything, we go to the kitchen and eat dessert.  A few words to sum this up: delicious, chaos, dancing, and music.

After all this is done it's about 9:45, and it's time for everyone to go home.

Timeline by Brittany

Hiya! Brittany here! 

Wow. Planning this trip is a lot of work. So many things to do and so little time to do it. We only have 15 meetings left before we’re off to Iceland! To get organized, we created a spreadsheet of things we have to do and dates by which they should be done. We spent an entire meeting doing this. “This should go on that day, and this should be done by then.” It took quite a long time to complete this. A list was made of everything that needed to be done (hostels, activities, transportation, etc.) and then we placed each thing on a date that it would be done by. For example, our last meeting was focused around activities that we could do in Iceland and England. And the meeting we are having tonight is focused around picking places to stay. It may seem like a lot at first, but it gets easier once we split the work up between the members in our groups. The girls in our troop are split up into different groups. Lizzy, Coumbah, and Emma are the England team, and Katie, Selina, Rosie, and I are the Iceland team. This makes research easier in that we don’t have everybody looking up the same thing. Organization has helped a lot in the process of research and panning for our over-seas trip.

Another CMM Story by Selina

Hello Everyone!
I haven't wrote much ever since I became the editor, but here I am now! Okay, getting right to the story!

Campfire Meadow Magic (for those of you who don't know, it is an event where our troop brings other troops of Girl Scouts to our leader's giant meadow in her backyard, and teach them basic and/or advanced skills on camping, survival, and fun ways to enjoy, appreciate, and respect good mother nature) this year was loads of fun as usual.  It is a troop fundraiser, and we earned about $500 in one day towards our trip.

I feel that this year's girls got a lot out of it, and I really hope that they had fun! I even made a new friend with my same name! A shout out to Selena! I hope you and your troop are having fun with the new knowledge, songs, and memories you've gained during our time together! :)

It is really magical when you see their eyes just light up when that first spark flies. To watch this generation of girls get their little hands into the soil and enjoying the feel of earth between their fingertips! It brings me back to when I was their age, sitting in the backyard making mud cakes and splashing in rain puddles. I only wish that I had an elder brother or sister to play with me, and teach me all about the wonders of the natural world.

That is why, my only wish this year, is that there were more young girls bursting with curiousity  like all of you who participated this year, eager to explore, create, and understand. I wish our troop got to work with more of them, and hopefully change the way they view the outdoors for the rest of their lives.

We will post more information on our next CMM session in Spring. We hope to see more old and new faces then!

Until next time, stay safe, have fun, and we cannot thank you all enough for your kindness and support!
Selina

Campfire Meadow Magic (CMM) by Rosie

Hi! This is Rosie writing! We did another Campfire Meadow Magic for our funds to Europe. It went pretty well, even though we didn’t make as much as we wanted to. This year we introduced “Primitive Camping” as an option for the girls. In primitive camping, girls could learn different knots, how to put up latrines, tents, and a wash station. I think the girls enjoyed that! We also had the regular activities at CMM like songs, skits, and S'mores and beginning fire building. Overall, Campfire Meadow Magic was another great success! A shout out thanks to the troops who participated! We hope to see you guys and many more new girls in next year's CMM! :)

Show Us How You Get Down!!!

Huge Groups for Songs, Skits, and S'mores

A Few of Our New Friends

Kidnap Breakfast by Katie

Last weekend the troop put on a fundraiser called Kidnap Breakfast where the leaders of other Girl Scout Troops with younger girls brought their girls to us (without telling them beforehand) in their pajamas to eat breakfast, make crafts, play games, and learn Girl Scout songs! It took a lot of work to set up and clean up (two hours before and two hours after the event!) but it was worth it because we had so much fun with the girls! They all seemed really excited to be there and when I taught them games (with the help of Lizzy and Emma) they were really energetic. Overall it was a great event, and I even had some of the girls recognize me when they saw me again at my church the other day and told me about how much they loved it! I'm also looking forward to seeing some of them again at Campfire Meadow Magic this weekend!

Teaching the Penguin Song

This was a fundraiser for our trip to Iceland and England next summer - we made about $350 from the event.

Our Jobs for the Year by Coumbah

 Last Friday we picked tasks for everyone in our troop to participate in. I became The President and our Sponsorship Representative, Selina and Brittany are in charge of Kidnap Breakfast, Rosie and Emma are in charge of Campfire Meadow Magic, Katie is the leader of the Iceland planning, and Lizzy is in charge of the England planning. Everyone seems super excited about what they are in charge of and we can't wait to continue our fundraising efforts and planning for our trip this summer!

Organizing Responsibilities

1640 Service Unit Meeting Presentation by Lizzy

Hi Lizzy here,
 On August 8th the troop made a presentation to the service meeting (a group of all the leaders in an area to discuss activities, money, etc.) We were there to present our fundraisers and our trip to Iceland and England. When we arrived, we passed out information sheets regarding the fundraising and introduced ourselves. I think that was the hardest part for me because it takes a lot of courage just to randomly say hi and talk, especially with these adults who didn’t really look like they wanted to have a conversation.The leaders there were all talking amongst themselves and we had to kind of politely insert ourselves in. The actual presentation went pretty smoothly, though despite the fact that we were all a bit nervous. Once we got the ball rolling however, it became easier to talk. It was mainly just to get some exposure on the troop and let everyone know how we were doing. It was definitely a learning experience, and I hope that it introduced the troop to the other leaders.

Coumbah Speaking at Our Service Unit Meeting

Left to Right: Selina, Katie, Coumbah

WHERE are we going? READ THIS!! by Rosie

Hey guys! I have some really exciting news! Ok, are you ready? (You better grab something to hold onto when you hear what has happened). All right, we have made our final decision about where we are going in Europe. We are going to (drumroll) England…and… Iceland!!!!!!!!! (I thought that deserved multiple exclamation marks…). Mrs. Susan and Mrs. Donna ordered the plane tickets a week ago! It’s official! WE ARE GOING TO EUROPE GUYS! :D

Looking at Europe Map

Leadership Workshop (Summer 2013) by Katie

Last week, the troop gathered in Mrs. Donna's house to complete a workshop on leadership and general useful life skills. We focused on subjects like how to work in a group, how to plan for the future, how to talk to people you've never met before, how to get a real job (including application and interview processes) and even looked at a college application. To go with each section, we did an activity to put what we were learning into action. For example, when we talked about getting a real job, we had the opportunity to interview each other with questions commonly asked to high school students during interviews.

The section that I got the most out of was the networking and talking to strangers section. I've never really liked greeting people, and I found it easier to just wait for people to approach me. However, we went over a lot in this section that I found pretty helpful! Our activity was to pretend that our leaders were leaders we had never met at a service meeting. We introduced ourselves with an elevator speech, tying us into the event. It gave me a pretty good idea of what to expect for when we actually go out and do so, and it gave me the confidence to try out those techniques in other places as well.

Left to right: Katie, Selina, Coumbah, Lizzy, Rosie, Emma, Brittany

Car Wash (April 20) by Rosie

Hi! It’s Rosie! I am in charge of the car wash. Recently, we had a car wash. All of the  girls showed up at the clubhouse at 11, and began the car wash. Here’s how it works: cars trickle in, and when we take a 5 minute break A TON of cars come in. Eventually we had to take shifts because all of us needed to eat our now warm ham sandwiches.  Girls talk to the customers about our plans for Europe. Some of them have actually been to those countries! How cool is that? By 3, we were all exhausted, and we started to pack up. We made $300, which is lower than we expected to make.  Thanks for supporting us! Rosie, OUT! :)

Car Wash Sign

Squeaky Clean!

Caving at Raccoon Mountain by Lizzy

Hey Lizzy here!
As my leader and fellow girl scouter have already described, I'm going to be dictating my story about the recent caving trip to Raccoon Mountain. c: It all began by us all getting onto our creeper van ( her name's Wanda - the Wanderer - get it? ) we drove for a short two hours and arrived at the mountain.

 I honestly didn't know what to expect, we were given little to no detail about the actual INSIDE of the cave. We were all super excited, given it was a little weird to be the only girls other than little kids and moms. We held our own though, I swear we got a few weird judgemental looks.... BUT its totally okay, we handled the cave awesome, take that boy scouts :P
 So after we parked and claimed a little space, we sent Britt and Coumbah to go check us in. While we waited we met our guide, his name was Chris (Chief Chris we later called him). We talked for a bit, he got the feel for our group (loud, exciting, but maybe more obnoxious c;). We waited for awhile and then head out to put on our gear. He all had a pair of knee pads and a hard hat helmet with head lights c: Let me tell you, you needed them. Throughout the entire trip I probably bumped my head against the rock 20 times.

When we got into the cave it was beautiful. I had never seen anything like it, there were stalagmites and stalactites all over, it was gorgeous. The trek lasted about 4 hours and during the time he had to crawl, slide, climb and contort ourselves. It was exhilarating and i felt pretty skinny that I could fit, so there's a plus c;
Anyway, it was incredibly fun and i wished i could've done it all night!

Coumbah and I had also made it our personal goal to get as muddy as possible, we were competing for muddiest against two twins who had previously come before. I think we came pretty close, from head to toe, I kid you not all you could see other than mud was our eyes and hair.

Clean up was ... difficult. I took especially long because I was one of the muddiest. Finally after spending an incredibly long time washing mud from every nook and cranny that my clothes didn't cover we went to go to sleep. As part of the excursion, we had decided to sleep in the cave. We all scouted out our spots to sleep and laid out sleeping gear out and called it a night.

In the morning, I was the first to wake up and my face was flawless. Chris told us before that the mud in the cave was the kind they used for spas and stuff... well it worked. It worked amazing. Because not only was I looking hot spankin awesome I was feeling great too. Totally energized, despite spending only about 5 hours sleeping, I felt like I could run 5 miles. After everyone had arisen, we all went to there breakfast, said our goodbyes and left; all with promises to come back next year. :)


Lizzy

Where I slept c:

Im the REALLY muddy asian in the middle!! Told you we got muddy.

My shoes got REALLY muddy

Caving at Raccoon Mountain by Susan

One of the benefits of having an older Girl Scout troop is you can let them make arrangements for things without double checking their plans, so I didn’t even look at what we were in for at Raccoon Mountain after Coumbah booked the event. And I’m not sure I would have really comprehended it if I had tried to look it up!
Getting outfitted in the knee pads and helmets with lights was kind of amusing outside of the cave,
but once inside, I realized how incredibly vital these tools are. As in, I can’t tell you how many times
I banged my head trying to stand up. The entry to the cave wasn’t so bad; we carried in our sleeping
bags and gear into a lighted channel of the cave and found relatively dry places for them. Then our
guide indicated a dark, low hole and told us to start crawling – crawling! – 25 feet into it, and then we
would stop and talk. This is when I realized I wouldn’t make it through the cave without knee pads.
There was barely room to crawl in this channel, and when we emerged and I banged my head for the
first time on the 5 foot ceiling (I’m 5’4”), I thought, “That wasn’t so bad!” – but little did I know. Because from that point forward we were in such narrow channels that the each person had to tell the next person the exact right place to put her hands and feet so she wouldn’t fall down a big chasm or slip into oblivion somewhere. Shortly, we were walking sideways on a ledge more narrow than my feet, using our hands for balance on the 75 degree wall opposite so we wouldn’t slip into the 30 foot drop between our hands and feet! Each challenge was met with a next challenge for FOUR HOURS – there were points (many) in which we were wriggling on our stomachs like loggerhead sea turtles through very narrow, long channels, sliding down muddy rocks, climbing up muddy, narrow rocks that required knotted, muddy ropes to scale, and walking through underground creeks full of cold water. Despite my best efforts, I was covered with mud, and some of my girls finished the job on themselves by coating their faces and hair in it. There were points in which two channels could be taken, one just barely enough to wiggle through, the other just enough to crawl through. The girls always took the tight one; I opted for the spacious side. Many times I had to just stop and BREATHE to get the courage to go through the next challenge. Did I mention it was DARK? I mean, we were in a cave! So the experience was even more scary. My main focus throughout the entire thing, I am sad to admit, was personal survival. I did NOT want to slip and hurt myself and have to be dragged out of the cave – how could they do that anyway? This was underlined for me as I was climbing a 12 foot muddy rock with shallow indentations only big enough for my toes when my own daughter went sliding back down the rock beside me, screaming, and I couldn’t even reach out to grab her. It would have taken me down, too. Pitiful, pitiful. At the end of this four hours, it was midnight, and we were left in the lighted channel to sleep in the cave. The girls didn’t want the light out; they wanted to see the cave around them. There was no nice little place to sleep; it was every woman for herself, find a relatively dry rock without too many angles and bumps, and put the sleeping bag down. Poor Donna had a dripper on her head all night, and I woke soaking wet in my sleeping bag – some pop-up stream appeared in the middle of the night and went right under my bag! The girls were so delighted with this trip they voted they wanted to come back every year. Any adult
volunteers?

Mrs. Susan, the most amazing leader ever!!

All the girls

Mrs. Donna best assistant leader ever

Caving at Raccoon Mountain by Emma

Hey Guys,

It's Emma!

As you know our troop has recently gone caving up in Tennessee at Raccoon Mountain.  We had an amazing adventure crawling, sliding and climbing through the cave.  At many parts of our adventure we were faced with extremely frightening challenges.  We also got very muddy.  Another thing is that the cave was beautiful and astounding.  We were all amazed in the different "rooms" during the tour. At one point our guide, Chief Chris, dove head first into a small hole in the cave.  It was like Alice in Wonderland through the rabbit hole he went.  It was so much fun, even though at some points it was really cramped.  If you ever want an amazing caving experience, go to Raccoon Mountain!

Emma left, Selina right

Beautiful

All the girls!

Cookie Booth Sales by Selina

Hey! This is Selina! As you all know, cookie sales have just finished for the year, and this year it hasn't been as productive as hoped, at least not for us.

Our assistant troop leader, Ms. Donna, made a GREAT booth for us to set up at the sale. It was big, bright and colorful and had a bunch of nifty gadgets to help us collect the money we earned. Unfortunately, we were unable to put the amazing booth to much use this year!

The weather was one of the bigger problems. This year, it's been extremely cold and windy, and our booth kept falling down and getting wet, but the main problem was that there weren't many interested customers.

In one sale I sold at with Brittney, we stood outside of Walgreen for nearly two hours after school. It was drizzling, windy, and cold, which usually doesn't bother us, but standing for two hours in that weather, was still quite a torment. After about 30 minutes, our sale number was still at 0 boxes, so Britt and I set a goal to sell at least 10 boxes. One hour later... we reached it!! So we said, "Okay, lets go for 12!" Well, that seemed to be the end of our luck because the sale number stayed at ten when we finally decided to pack up... except... then a nice lady came and she told us that she'd buy some from us too. And in my head I was thinking, "Please buy two boxes!!!" and then she said that she'd take a Samoa and a thin mint and in my mind I was dancing and singing "Celebration!!!!"

After a few more sales and a lot of help from our family and friends, we finally sold off all the boxes. Whew! Its good to be done with that!
But, another problem is that we didn't get a lot of donations this year either. You see, our troop only gets about 50 cents for each box of cookies that we sell.

Anyways, I just want to say, that all of you who bought cookies this year, whether from us or another Girl Scout troop, that we'd like to thank you and your support, and that we hope you enjoy your cookies!

Selina and Brittany outside Walgreens

Brittany and Emma outside Kroger

Meeting with Joey (Feb. 1-2) by Emma

Our Faithful Followers,

This new addition of Adventure Forever is about a dear friend of Mrs. Susan's, Joey's visit to our meeting.  She has been to Europe before and visited most of the countries we are debating going to.  These countries include Germany, Switzerland, Ireland and France and England, and has heard much about Greece so she could also give us information about that, too.  She talked about WAGGS {World Association Of Girl Guided and Girl Scouts}, world centers {she has been to all four of them} and she even told us that there is a fifth center being created in Africa.

After her visit, some of us have changed our choice country we would like to visit.

Thanks, Joey!

Its Joey!

Planning for Raccoon Mountain by Coumbah

This January the troop decided we wanted to go to Raccoon Mountain and go caving. I volunteered to set up the whole trip. After the meeting I decided to go and call the Raccoon Mountain people and set up the trip, When I called I talked to this very nice lady and I got a whole lot of information about Raccoon mountain and what the caving experience is like. I asked a lot of questions about what exactly would happen once we got to the site and what we were going to be doing so I could tell all the girls exactly what Raccoon Mountain trip would be like. At the next meeting I told the girls all the general information to make sure that everyone still wanted to go before I called and actually made reservations. The girls all agreed that they still wanted to go, so the next day I called in and talked to a man who helped me set a reservation for our trip. I was sent more information about the trip and what we needed to bring and with that I made a packing list that included everything we all had to bring on this trip. This whole process so far is very much something I enjoy because I love talking to people and meeting new people so much that being responsible of getting information and setting reservations for our trip was no problem for me.

Research: England and Ireland by Selina

Hello! It’s Selina again. So for our research assignments, I got Ireland and England. SOOO excited!!! If you look on a map, you’ll see the two countries right next to each other. They’re part of the United Kingdom in Europe. England is a great place with all the famous actors and actresses, and the museums and art, but I admit, I’m more excited about Ireland! The place has just about everything to enjoy, from waterfalls, to grasslands, to beaches, and towns. Oh, and don’t forget the amazing rainbows! Their grass looks so green and amazing, and the cliffs look so daring and treacherous! I feel like elves and trolls and unicorns and other mythical creatures are going to pop out of the ground or emerge from the woods at any time! The place just looks so much like a fantasy, and so peaceful. I really hope that we’ll go to Ireland, but if not, someday in my life; I am definitely going to spend a month there or something

Ireland

England... 

Car Wash by Rosie

Our troop has this one fundraiser that gets everyone excited, it is the car wash. I am in charge of the arrangements. I have to contact our neighborhood’s president, and she decides if we can use the clubhouse. Since our troop is based in our neighborhood, we can use it! We have raised over $400 dollars doing our fun car wash, thanks to all who have contributed to our troop!

Research: Italy by Lizzy

Hihi~ Lizzy here:

Since we’re going to Europe, we were all assigned a specific country to research. I’m pretty sure Mrs. Susan gave us all countries that had to do with us…. Like, since Brittany really loves Greece, so she was given it. I take Latin at school so, I was given Italy. C: Not going to lie, researching it was a bit of a pain in the butt, especially because all my teachers randomly decided to ALL give projects and make them all practically due on the same day. Anyway, while I was researching I really started to love Italy; it’s a really cool country. Because I’m learning so much of the culture in school, the historical sites and buildings really fascinate and intrigue me. Honestly, and I’m not just saying this because it’s my project, I think Italy would be a really good choice for us. It has a rustic feel to it, even in the cities but the cities are full of tourist attractions and the food! There’s also a lot of wilderness so, CAMPING. HOWEVER, the country I want to go to most of all is France. It may be expensive, but I feel something in my gut telling us to go to France…… c: I'm conflicted. >.<

ITALY FLAG C:

Observations: Watching the Girls of 1640 by Donna

Watching the girls run our Campfire Meadow Magic (CMM) event recently made me remember the first time our troop orchestrated this event.  The girls were just plain scared!  Scared about being in front of large groups...scared about getting tongue tied...scared about forgetting words to a song or skit....scared they couldn’t start their fire during the fire-building demonstration.  But now, watching them years later as young confident women, they know exactly what to do.  They confidently speak to store managers soliciting supply donations for the event.  They excitedly jump up in front of 45 girls, leaders, and parents and sing their hearts out without even thinking about it.   They skillfully teach the girls how to build one match fires, forgetting that it wasn’t so long ago they themselves had just learned how.   And they’re no longer afraid!!   Susan and I simply let them lead the whole event, and we're there in case there is any blood - which there never has been.  Most of the participants don't even know there are adult leaders there.  I am very proud of each of them and I am blessed to have been a part of their growth and achievements.

Most recent CMM

Most recent CMM

Most recent CMM

Most recent CMM

                                                   

1st CMM

1st CMM

1st CMM