Girl Scout trip to Yellowstone December 22, 2009

Troop 22213 spent the last week of July enjoying Yellowstone National Park. The vacation started early on Sunday morning. The girls were excited and settled into the 12-passenger van that would become their “home” for the next 23 hours. As we were leaving town, we decided to take a detour and see Mount Rushmore. It added on some time to the trip, but it was worth it. The girls enjoyed being able to see this national monument, and it was amazing seeing something that we had only seen in pictures. After the stop, we continued on our way to West Yellowstone. We arrived at 3 a.m. The girls were sent right to bed for a few hours of sleep before our activities really began.

The first day, we went to Fountain Paint Pots and Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park. The girls learned that you cannot rush mother nature!

Day two brought us to a ranch where they taught us how to Fly Fish. It was a great experience. We then had supper with a Girl Scout Junior troop from West Yellowstone. They brought their flags, and we had a flag ceremony. After supper we went to the local Smokejumper base and learned all about smokejumping. It was a lot of fun.

Day three was exhausting but fun. The morning started with a nine-mile horseback ride that lasted two hours. One of our guides’ grandparents were from Faribault! After our ride, we enjoyed a great lunch of buffalo burgers and brats. The girls even had some time to rock climb.

Then the adventure began. We went white water rafting. It was the most fun experience we had. We all slept great that night!

Our last day, we spent at the Canyon in Yellowstone. We had “hobo lunches” that we made over a fire, and then we went on a ranger hike to look at the falls. They were wonderful. While in Yellowstone, we completed the Jr Ranger badge and learned a lot along the way! There was a little time found to do some shopping as well.

The next morning was early as we loaded up and got ready to call the van our “home” again. This time the trip only took us about 18 hours. All in all, we had a great time. The girls were wonderful, and we could not have asked for a better trip!

- Robin, troop leader

Click here to see more photos from there trip.

Operation Christmas Child December 10, 2009

Wow what an awesome night! We had a great meeting this past Monday night. Our 10 Girl Scout Daisies in Troop 13601 put together 17 boxes of gifts for Operation Christmas Child. We are so proud to see them give to a child they most likely will never even see. What a gift to learn to give. We are very fortunate to have received a large donation of small items to fill the boxes from Scholastic Book Fairs and to have the pleasure of working with Grace Fellowship Church. Tracy and I are so proud of our girls!

Shari Grundy & Tracy Weber
Girl Scout Daisy Troop 13601

Girl Scout Halloween December 1, 2009

The Stewart/Brownton Girl Scouts recently held their annual Halloween/Juliette Low Birthday Party. Girl Scouts were encouraged to invite non-Girl Scout friends to come and party with them. They all came in costume and brought canned goods for the local food shelf. The Girl Scouts had planned several activities for all to participate in, including “bobbing” for apples and donuts (suspended from a sting on a broom handle), making witches brooms and witches brew, and assorted games. The girls also learned about Juliette Low, the founder of Girl Scouts, whose birthday is on October 31. Snacks were enjoyed by all.

Girl Scout vegetable garden October 19, 2009

Mound Girl Scout Troop 12415 planted a vegetable garden in May and donated produce throughout the summer to the Westonka Food Shelf. The final harvest of the season was Friday, October 9. In total, the girls donated more than 100 pounds of food over the course of the growing season using seeds, a few donated plants, and girl power!

Jack Wiest coordinated the produce deliveries to the Westonka food shelf, and free use of the garden plot was provided by Our Lady of the Lake Church.

See more photos on River Valleys’ Facebook page.

Jordan Girl Scout Bronze Award Project October 9, 2009

Jordan Girl Scout Junior Troop 21220 spent time planting flowers around Lagoon park in Jordan. This community service opportunity was just one of many planned activities to help the troop earn their Girl Scout Bronze Award. The girls have chosen the theme “Beautifying Our Community” and will also be organizing the Adopt-a-Highway fall clean-up and a holiday decorating project for local community businesses. They are also spending time within their own homes with recycling and yard projects.

The troop leaders and girls met this summer and we asked the girls what they wanted their troop year and Bronze Award project to be. They really enjoy non-traditional troop meetings that allow them to explore new ideas and concepts. The girls are also really busy with other extracurricular activities, so we also wanted this year to be more flexible to meet the demands of their schedules without overwhelming them. The conversation about this type of meeting generated a lot of ideas for a project and as we put them on paper, they all fell around the general theme of “beautifying our community.” We discussed what the word “community” meant. They said things like: buildings, schools, people, your city, or even a family. Those conversations evolved into a plan for this year.



We took their ideas and did some research: Linda Steinhoff, troop leader, contacted the City of Jordan and asked if there were any projects with which our troop could help; that turned into our Lagoon Park planting project. I contacted the manager at the Schule Haus and asked what we could do; that will be our valentines card making project to be delievered to the residents. The girls really wanted to do something else that could be seen around town; that will become our handmade holiday decorations that will be distributed around to community businesses.



Some of the  girls have also worked on building Teraya’s Garden, a community garden at Jordan Elementary School dedicated to the memory of a student who was killed in a car accident last year. The troop is sponsoring this year’s Jordan Service Unit Adopt-a-Highway Fall Clean-up, as well as recycling and helping with home projects and planting trees this Spring. The girls are looking forward to finding other ways to contribute to their community.

-Carrie Speikers, troop leader

Faribault Girl Scout Balloon Rally October 7, 2009

Last month, Girl Scout Daisy through  Cadette troops in Faribault participated in the 25^th Annual Airfest and Balloon Rally, a community-wide event at the Faribault Airport.  Troops signed up for one-hour time slots to work at the Girl Scout booth.  The girls helped children and passersby make various styles of paper aircraft and parachutes.  Leaders were present to assist as needed.

There was also a Girl Scout information display set up where the general public could stop in and ask questions about Girl Scouting in Faribault (or River Valleys in general).  This was a wonderful opportunity for the girls to learn and practice leadership and public relations skills.

Faribault’s service unit also invited Miss Washington County, Mary Swenson, to partake in the festivities, and the girls loved her. She mingled with the Girl Scouts and the audience, worked with the girls in the activities booth, was a featured guest speaker, appeared on stage and shared her platform (self-esteem building through the uniquely ME! program), participated in numerous  photo opportunities, gave autographs, etc.

The Girl Scouts also packed up bags filled with goodies and coupons (including Girl Scout brochures/bookmarks) and passed them out to passersby.

The Salad Bowl September 30, 2009

The “Salad Bowl” has replaced the “melting pot” as an analogy for the USA. A melting pot requires ingredients to give up their individual flavor. A salad, on the other hand, needs each ingredient to retain its uniqueness and participate in the overall flavor. The Salad is meant to provide girl and adult Girl Scouts with resources and ideas to recognize, celebrate and participate in the River Valleys’ “salad.” Bertrene Cage welcomes comments and suggestions at 763-971-4046 or bertrene.cage@girlscourtsrv.org.

National Disability Employment Awareness Month

Diversity means differences. Human diversity means differences among people. It’s all of us in our rich and infinite variety. So in October we celebrate people who are differently-abled.

Congress designated each October as National Disability Employment Awareness Month. This effort to educate the American public about issues related to disability and employment actually began in 1945, when Congress enacted a law declaring the first week of October as “National Employ the Physically Handicapped Week.” In 1962, the word “physically” was removed to acknowledge the employment needs and contributions of individuals with all types of disabilities. In the 1970s, a historic shift in disability public policy occurred. For the first time, the exclusion of people with disabilities was viewed as discrimination. The efforts of disability activists led to significant changes in laws, such as the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990 and the designation of a full month to recognize the potential of America’s 30 million working-age people with disabilities.

October

Diversity Awareness Month

National Breast Cancer Awareness Month

National Disability Employment Awareness Month

17 – Diwali (Buddhist, Hindu)

21 – Cirio de Nazare (Brazil)

25 – Mother-In-Law Day

31 – Reformation Day (Christian)

November

American Diabetes Month

National AIDS Awareness Month

National American Indian Heritage Month

1 – All Saints’ Day (Christian, Roman Catholic)

1 – Dia de los Muertos “Day of the Dead” (Mexico, Latin America)

2 – All Souls’ Day (Roman Catholic)

12 – Birthday of Baha’u'llah (Baha’i)

27 – Eid al-adha (Islamic, Muslim)

*Holy days usually begin at sundown the day before this date

Our Girl Scout trip to Savannah August 25, 2009

June 28, 2009. It’s 5 a.m. as our sleepy mother-daughter troop from Prior Lake and Savage – Jill and Jamie Stang, Margaret and Stacey LaFrance, and Monique and Lauren Rupp – heads off to the airport, anxiously awaiting our arrival in Atlanta, Georgia. As our plane touches down and we begin our road trip to Savannah, we first make a quick stop at the World of Coke museum in downtown Atlanta, where we experienced some good and some not-so-good Coke products from around the world.

We head off again and drive four hours until finally reaching our destination at the Mulberry Inn in Historic Savannah. What was once a cotton factory, and later became the first ever Coca-Cola bottling factory, had now become our hotel for our week in historic Savannah.

Our first day in Savannah was spent touring the historic city with the Old Savannah Trolley Tours. That same night, we were scared out of our wits while touring the Weed Sorrell Mansion, one of the top ten most haunted houses in the U.S. We awoke the second day to the history and flag semi-fore of Old Fort Jackson. There we were able to watch a real firing of a cannon, and we took a tour of the civil war barracks inside the fort’s walls. We spent the remainder of the day on a dolphin tour out on Tybee Island, where we learned about Atlantic bottle nose dolphins and their habitat. Wednesday morning we drove back out to Tybee Island to climb 178 steps to the top of the lighthouse on the Island. After climbing back down, we toured the house of the lighthouse keeper, where we found a picture of Dan Patch hanging on the wall above the mantel. We all thought this was amazing because our hometown of Savage is named after Dan Patch’s owner M.W. Savage, and Dan Patch and his owner were from Savage.

We also took part in a marine beach walk that afternoon, where we learned about the Georgia salt marshes, the marine life that lived there, and how to protect it. We ended that perfect day with a swim in the Atlantic Ocean and a fabulous lunch at a pink restaurant on the beach called Fannies.

Our last day in Savannah was spent at the Juliette Gordon Low house! We started our day by doing an interest session called Fabrics, Fashions, and Frills. During this session we were fortunate enough to learn everything from the proper way to wear a corset, to how to attach a bustle enhancer to get the true bustle look of the 1880s. Then we took a tour of Juliette Gordon Low’s birthplace. We ended our day with a true Victorian dinner, where we dressed up in dresses of Juliette’s day, and even ate off of replicas of the china she had painted!

It was amazing just seeing in that one day how one woman was able to make such a difference in the world with one idea. Juliette Gordon Low has done some awe-inspiring things for girls that people will remember forever.

The next day we woke up bright and early, to make a long road trip so we could arrive in Atlanta in time to catch our flight back home.

All in all, we learned bits and pieces of everything, all the way from how to wave a civil war flag to how to wear the best fashions of the 1880s, proper dinner manners for a dinner party, and about the founder of Girl Scouting in America. We had been saving up our Girl Scout cookie money for years to fund this trip, and after it was over, we can definitely say that it was worth every penny.

Girl Scouts at Rondo Days July 29, 2009

For more information about Rondo Days, visit http://rondodays.com/.

Girl Scouts at the Isanti Parade July 14, 2009

On Thursday, July 9, 26 Girl Scouts from the Cambridge-Isanti Service Unit came together for the Isanti Jubilee Days Parade to spread the word about the fun Girl Scouts are having in their area. The girls shared their Encampment theme, CSI:GSU (Crime Scene Investigation: Girl Scout Unit). The banner seen in the picture includes the finger prints from all girls and adults that were at the Cambridge-Isanti Service Unit Encampment at Camp Elk River in May. The girls had a fantastic time singing and playing some awesome songs over the speakers on the float.