Girl Scouts: Still looking for a girl to present to SAGE after school Monday

Hi everyone,

We're still looking for a girl to present to talk to the SAGE group after school on Monday about joining in with our Walking Trail Audit on the 9th.  It seems like the Talent Show and Orthodontists are stealing all our girls on Monday!

I hope someone brave can make it--the SAGE volunteers would be very helpful!  The girl can bring notes, to cover the 5 "W's" but need to be able to speak to 5-8 grandma's and grandpa's on their own for 5 minutes.

Aleks

Girl Scouts: Silver Update IMPORTANT and Cookie Prize Reminder

Hi everyone!

First, the girls did a GREAT job working with the Greendale Heath Department on Tuesday.  They got a lot of details locked down and approved, and came up with some good ideas.

Here's where we are at:

FIRST:  June 9th, from 12:00-2:00, we officially have use of the little parking lot by the Greendale Health Department as a staging area for groups to meet, where we will give them clipboards, snacks, water, maps, and checklists so they can walk the paths of Greendale and highlight opportunities for improvements.

SO, if your scout signed up to do flyers, we have our details.  Make sure to include these 5 "W's" on the flyer (not necessarily in this order or format, but this format would be OK.) :

Who: Anyone interested in making Greendale a healthier and more accessible place for everyone!  Leashed dogs welcome, but be sure to clean up!  Register at  https://tinyurl.com/greendalewalk

Where:  Meet at the Greendale Health Department Parking Lot 5650 Parking Street

When:  Meet at 12:00 Saturday June 9th

What:  Families and groups will walk the paths in Greendale to highlight opportunities for improvement and rate their "walkability" using AARP drafted checklists and guides.

Why:  Walking is a great way to stay healthy, so for our Girl Scout Silver Award project we'd like to make walking in Greendale as accessible and easy for everyone as possible!

The girls set a deadline to have the flyers distributed through schools, Greendale businesses, to other scout groups, and other local organizations BEFORE MAY 25th.  So if you're making a flyer, please have it completed by next week Wednesday, May 16th.

NEXT:  The girls got permission to present our project after school (3:05) next Monday May 14th at the Health Department to Greendale's SAGE workgroup (Successful Aging in Greendale for Everyone.)  WE NEED SOME SCOUTS TO GO AND PRESENT THERE.   We need someone brave enough to speak in public to 5-6 people, and who can summarize the 5 "W's" as well as explain why it's important to make the world a better place and why being healthy and having better accessibility to the walking paths would be a good thing.    (They can bring notes if they want, but the presenting has to be by the girls.)

NEXT:  The girls also discovered that the "walking map" that the Health Department had for Greendale didn't actually include any of the walking paths in Greendale!  Oh No!  So we have to either find, or make maps that do.  The girls came up with the idea of contacting the Greendale Department of Public Works, and the Greendale Historical Society to see if they have maps that show the paths in Greendale.  WHO CAN DO THAT?  

Those are the pressing and immediate jobs right now.  The Village is very excited about this project!  Great job so far girls!

One last thing:  Did you get your cookie prizes yet?  Let me know when you can come.  After 8:00 is usually best, since we generally have soccer until late.

Thanks, and happy scouting everyone!

Aleks

Girl Scouts SIlver: Need 2-3 Scouts to meet with Greendale Health Department after school Tuesday

Hi everyone!

Since our project is working pretty closely with the Greendale Health Department, we've set up a meeting after school on Tuesday so we can brainstorm and work out ideas and needs/etc.

I'll need 2-3 scouts (or more!) to join in and work with Greendale's Village Health Department to create this awesome way to make Greendale a better place for all ages!  It'll be right after school, and I don't imagine it taking longer than 45 minutes to an hour or so. 

Please let me know if your scout can join in!

Aleks

Girl Scouts: Silver Award start up jobs!

Hi everyone!

If you read the notes from the April meeting, you saw that the girls voted to work on a project suggested by the Greendale Health Department as their Silver Award Project.

The project would consist of organzing a community audit of Greendale's walking trails, working on the fixes the audit discovered, and finally re-creating the Greendale Walking Path Brochure and updating it to be current and accurate.

There are a few jobs that have to get done pretty quickly in order to get a jump on the project before school wraps up.

We also have to pick a date for the community walking path audit event.  Would the daytime on June 9th (the day after the last day of school) work for most of you?  That would be soon enough that people wouldn't forget, and would also give us the chance to advertise it at the Greendale "School's Out" event in the afternoon on June 8th.  (That was where our scouts did their Bike Safety event last year, and SPOILER we'll try to also do a single bike safety booth there this year (with the wheel, coloring pages, brochures, etc. all in one place.)  We may also enlist a couple scouts to do the "Make Your Own Game" activity on the field by the Middle School this year too.

Here are the jobs that need to get done right now.  If your scout picks the "Make a flyer" then leave the date blank for the moment.  And if your scout picks the "Contact the Health Department about reserving the Hose Tower" just hold off on that until we lock in a date. 

https://www.signupgenius.com/go/10c0a4fa5ad22a13-silver

I look forward to seeing our scouts get creative and really make a lasting impact on our Village!

Aleks

Girl Scouts: Cookie prizes and final balances?

Hi everyone,

I have cookie prizes!  So if your girl earned stuffed animals, t-shirts, tickets, passes, PACs, then we'll have to set up a time for you to get them.

Usually later evenings (8:00+) is best, though I think Monday is more likely to be even later.

Also, if you still owe cookie money, I would need to collect that first.

Thanks everyone!  Keep scouting!

Aleks

Girl Scouts: P.S. Camp Out Theme: "Under the Sea"

Hi again,

I forgot to add that the 2018 campout theme is "Under the Sea" so the t-shirt and patch designs should reflect that.

Good night!

Aleks

Girl Scouts: So much fun making the world a better place!

Hi everyone!

Some quick recaps and important notes from today.  (And one optional piece of fun homework, so make sure you get all the way to the end!!)

First though:  Make sure your scout does a "tick check" before going to bed tonight.  They were climbing around in the woods a lot, and now's the season when those bugs are waking up.

We started the meeting with our troop's Earth Day tradition (pictures attached) of collecting garbage around the school.  They found so much.  And their teachers were sure impressed.  The GMS staff was very thankful for the girls' work keeping the school beautiful.

We followed up by turning into amateur wilderness foragers, and environment-savers!  We talked a little bit about invasive species and why they are a problem, then we went hunting through the GMS forest to find garlic mustard--an invasive species starting to really overgrow Wisconsin. We pulled up bags and bags of garlic mustard through the forest (pictures also attached) BUT, even though garlic mustard is bad for our local environment, it is GOOD for us--we turned it into a delicious garlic-mustard-pesto snack.  (recipe below)

Then we headed inside and took care of some Girl Scout business.  We talked about our upcoming Girl Scout badge/Journey work:  "MEdia" and divided up responsibility for leading different areas of his badge work.  The girls all signed up to take charge of a certain section of the work.

THEN we also had some decision making to do.  Our troop has our Silver Award project coming up, and the Greendale Health Department asked us if we were interested in doing our project with them.  The project was going to be 3 parts: 

1)  Organize a community event where kids and grown ups and older folks got together, and then spread out and audited and appraised Greendale's walking paths, looking for areas to improve.

2)  Actually do those improvements (for example, adding benches, signs, etc.) and for this, they've already received a $250 grant from the Greendale Women's Club to help with expenses--and that's ours to use!

3)  Also re-make the Greendale Walking Path brochure the Health Department uses that was a Boy Scout Eagle Project about 20 years ago, because it has a lot (LOT) of out of date information.

So we talked a little bit about this, and the girls voted, and decided this would be a good project to do to help the community and make the world a better place.

Finally, we ate our garlic mustard pesto, and also cooked our birthday-cakes-in-a-cup (recipe also below) for a wrap-up treat.

Whew!  We did a lot.  It's no wonder we ran late!  Thanks for everyone's patience!

RECIPES:

1)  Garlic Mustard Pesto

Ingredients:

Equal parts spinach and garlic mustard leaves (cleaned and dried)

Olive oil 

Parmesan cheese

Instructions:

In a food processor, chop spinach and garlic mustard.  Add olive oil until it reaches desired consistency.  Add parmesan cheese to taste.

Optional:

Add lemon juice, nuts, pine nuts, or sugar to taste.

2)  Microwave Birthday Cake In a Cup

Vanilla mug cake

4 Tbsp. flour

3 Tbsp. sugar

1/2 tsp. baking powder

1-2 tsp sprinkles

4 Tbsp. milk

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

Pinch of salt

Combine all ingredients and then add to a greased mug that's at least 16 oz. Microwave for 90 seconds.

OPTIONAL HOMEWORK (FUN!!!)

It's time to design a cmap t-shirt and patch for next year!  Our troop has a history of getting our designs picked for the Green Corners Campout shirt or patch almost every year.  Let's keep the streak alive.  I've attached the design submission form.  Email or get it into my hands by May 13th in order for it to be entered for the September campout!  This design will be worn by Girl Scouts from all across Greenfield, Hales Corners, and Greendale!