It's Girl Scout Night...

Every other Thursday night I lead a troop of 2nd-grade Brownie Girl Scouts. It is always an adventure!

When my daughter was in kindergarten, I looked into Daisy Girl Scouts for her. She is one of those kids that doesn't really like to spend all of her time doing any one certain thing. Rather, she likes to try all sorts of things. Girl Scouts really seemed like it would be a good outlet for her (after a first-and-last miserable season of soccer we needed something fun for her to try!). However, there were no troops that she was able to join! So, I stepped up and offered to lead a Daisy troop.

It was supposed to be a one-year commitment.... BUT.... when the newly-bridged Brownies couldn't find a troop to "fly up" to, I agreed to lead the Brownie troop. We're now in our second year of Brownies, and it's mostly a lot of fun.

The hardest part is the planning. I tend to be a procrastinator, so I leave most of my meeting plans until the day of the meeting. That sometimes works just fine, but often leaves me a crazed mess for most of the day. Thank goodness we only meet once a month!

Tonight's meeting is fairly simple. We'll be celebrating World Thinking Day. This year's theme is way too mature for younger Girl Scouts (it's "preventing the spread of HIV, Malaria and other diseases" - no way am I touching HIV with 2nd graders!), so we are going to focus on only the preventing the spread of disease. My co-leader arranged to borrow this machine to help the girls learn about how easily germs spread and how to wash their hands correctly.

We're also going to have a short ceremony. We had 2 new girls join our troop this year, and they will be "invested" into scouts tonight. The girls feel so important when they do a ceremony, and the parents just eat this stuff up!

I enjoy being a Girl Scout leader, and I am proud that I can do it for my daughter. However, it's becoming increasingly difficult to be a good leader. I have so many children in my care during the day that it's impossible to find planning time. Field trips and camping must be done on weekends, and I work on Saturdays. I have terrible guilt over not being able to take the girls on more trips, but I have to put my little part-time job first (since my family is counting on that income). This is yet another reason why I consider going back to full-time work - having my nights and weekends totally free to interact with my children and their activities. Just another example of how BIG my BIG DECISION really is - and how it creeps into my everyday life.