First real older girl meeting

Wow! I'm so excited - I have 11 older girls! 7 Cadettes, 3 Seniors, and 1 Ambassador - woohoo!

When I originally got into Girl Scouts, 9 years ago, I wanted to be a Cadette leader. I was a Cadette as a girl, and that's my favorite age group.

I've had older girls for a couple of years now, and we've had some great times. But I don't think I've ever had more than 4 girls.

And now - 11. Fundraisers are going to be so much easier. We could do a car wash. We can make fried apple pies, and we won't have to kill ourselves. Maybe we really can do a spaghetti dinner, or a pancake breakfast. Maybe we really can raise enough money for a trip to New York, or even Europe.

We really didn't do anything last night - just spent some time getting to know each other, and each girls interests, so we can narrow down what badges we'd like to work on. Talked about the journeys we are going to do, and hopefully encouraged them to go for the Silver and Gold awards.

We also managed to help 2 girls finish their bridging to Cadettes Award. With the new requirements, it was almost too easy. Of course, having all age levels built into one troop does make things like Bridging a lot easier.

It occurred to me that very few of these girls had any say in the choice of a trip to Atlanta, GA. So next meeting, we'll talk about traveling, why it's a good choice, and why they might want to go someplace else. My Ambassador has been there, and loved the trip when she went, so I'm going to make her talk to the girls about why we should go there. And then, it's up to them. If they pick someplace different, and come up with a plan for that place, I have no problems at all taking a different trip. Whatever they decide, they need to be excited about where we are going. Otherwise, why will they bother trying to raise money? Perhaps I can work part of the traveller badge into it - although my older girls have already earned it...

We originally picked Atlanta because it's in our region, and therefore the Juniors can go. And they are very excited about Atlanta.