The Count Down Begins!

Can you believe it? December is just flying by. Excitement builds as each day passes with the anticipation of holiday festivities. In particular, the Girl Scout Shop's Annual Holiday Celebration! Saturday December 18th will be a day of pure delight when Mrs. Clause breaks from her busy schedule to visit the Girl Scout Shop. She will be visiting and taking picutes from 10am-4pm. Be sure to tell her any messages you want Santa to get! Bring a canned food donation for our local food banks and get your picture taken for FREE! Helpful elves will also be here to assist in all the fun. Don't forget, we will have the brand new journey books- IT'S YOUR STORY-TELL IT! There will be all kinds of fun activities that compliment these amazing books.



While you're here don't forget to take advantage of all the great one-time-only specials we will be offering...

-Spend $50.00 or more and get a FREE STUFFED BEAR dressed in a cute sweatshirt

-15% OFF any Long Sleeve fashion item

-20% OFF all Holiday Ornaments

*Don't forget to stock up on stocking stuffers too. We carry Groovy Girl Dolls, Karito Kids Dolls,

Webkins, and a variety of fun toys and games.

*If you're making the trip anyway, plan ahead for World Thinking Day 2011 and Cookie Sales.



Come share your passion for Girl Scouts and embrace the spirit of giving! See you there!

Fun at the Girl Scout Shop

Have you heard of all of the exciting things going on at the Girl Scout Shop? Where do I even begin? There all all kinds of great new items and a spectacular holiday window display to come check out. Oh, and do I ever have the insider tip for you! Come by the shop on Saturday December 18th for the Grand Premiere of the third Leadership Journeys, "It's your story-Tell it." Join in on all the fun activities and be one of the first to get a taste of these thrilling new Journeys. And did I mention Mrs. Clause will be here? Have your photo taken with Mrs. Clause and shop for all of your holiday gifts too. Enjoy the Card Making Station where you'll get a chance to share your favorite holiday story or memory. Cards will be collected and donated to a local Senior Center where they will surely spread some holiday cheer! Rumor has it that sometime in the afternoon, there will even be a special guest appearance by our Council's own mini-horse, Nettie! You simply can't miss this event so mark your calendars now! Come join in on all the fun and excitement. Can't wait to see you there!

-Velina from the Shop

Want to be on TV? Volunteer at the KVIE 2010 Membership Pledge Drive!

Do you want to be on TV? Do you like showing your Girl Scout pride? November 27th- December 12th, KVIE Public Television is offering a unique opportunity for Girl Scouts to perform community service, receive important television exposure and help public television continue its mission of educating, enriching, and enlightening diverse audiences in the Central Valley Region.

We need energetic Girl Scouts to volunteer their time to help answer phones at the 2010 Membership Pledge Drive. By volunteering your time, you will help KVIE raise funds which are necessary to support the mission of Public Television and also have the opportunity for Girl Scouts to be identified on TV.

Don’t miss this…

Available Phone Bank Shifts:

November 27^th- December 12^th

Mon-Fri

7:15pm-11pm

Sat & Sun

8:30am-12pm (Sat only)

11:15am-4pm

3:15pm-8pm

7:15pm-11pm

Email marcomm@girlscoutshcc.org if you (or your troop) are interested in volunteering and want to sign up for a phone bank shift!

FUN FACT: Juliette Gordon Low turns 150 years old on October 31st

Juliette Gordon Low was, and still is, an extremely important part of Girl Scouts. Without her, where would Girl Scouts be today? Her vision led to unlimited opportunities for girls nationwide, and we should acknowledge all of the wonderful things she did for us.

Did you know that Juliette Gordon Low came up with the idea of Girl Scouts after meeting the founder of Boy Scouts, Sir Robert Baden-Powell, in England in 1912? Girls were demanding a similar organization for themselves, so immediately after Juliette returned to the United States, she created Girl Scouts with the vision of helping girls become productive and responsible women. Girl Scouts began with just a small gathering of 18 girls and is now an international movement with over 3.7 million girl and adult members. Isn't that incredible!?

Due to her national recognition and success with Girl Scouts, Juliette Gordon Low was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 1979. In 1983, President Ronald Regan signed a bill naming a new federal building in Savannah in honor of Juliette Gordon Low. it was the second federal building in US history to be named after a woman.

Girl Scouts throughout the country plan to recognize her birthday with parties, service projects, and events. Is your troop doing anything to acknowledge this special event? please let us know by posting a comment or sending us an e-mail at marcomm@girlscoutshcc.org.

Also, be sure to visit the GSHCC's new Program Center, featuring a historical museum packed with vintage uniforms and artifacts from Girl Scout past. Register online to visit the museum, where you can learn more about Juliette Gordon Low and the history of Girl Scouts.

Do you know a lot about Juliette Gordon Low? Click here to take a quiz and find out.

The Girl Scout Shop is YOUR Resource

The Girl Scout Shop is a great resource for leaders and parents that need ideas or have questions. The shop staff has decades of Girl Scout experience and can answer questions ranging from which patch to buy to the Girl Scout Gold Award. Click here to meet the staff...

The shop also has a Girl Scout library that includes books with project ideas and tapes/Cd's with Girl Scout songs to sing at troop meetings. Everything in the library can be checked out free of charge.

The new fall fashion clothing line is in the shop now and new items are being put on the shelves everyday. Click here to view some of the fall fashion line...

Also, don't forget all profits fund services for your local Girl Scouts! Visit the shop today...

Forever Green Day!

Did you know that Forever Green Day is this Wednesday, October 6th?

Forever Green Day is a day specifically dedicated to celebrating the sisterhood of Girl Scouts and acknowledging that once you're a Girl Scout, you're always a Girl Scout.

Girl Scouts has played an important role in the lives of many girls nationwide. We love hearing about the amazing things that Girl Scouts has done for girls, such as teaching them valuable skills, giving them incredible opportunities, creating lifelong memories, and letting them earn prestigious awards. Send us your Girl Scout stories by emailing us at marcomm@girlscoutshcc.org or if you've earned your Girl Scout Gold Award and would like to tell us about it click here.

The color green is obviously very symbolic to Girl Scouts, so the GSHCC Program Center plans to celebrate Forever Green Day by wearing green clothing and even eating green-colored food on October 6th! Be sure to let us know how you plan to celebrate Girl Scouts on Forever Green Day by leaving a comment or sending us an email at marcomm@girlscoutshcc.org.

Follow our Forever Green Day 2010 countdown on Facebook (click here to view our fan page) and be sure to make your Facebook status about Forever Green Day as a way to show your Girl Scout pride and remind others about the special day.

Fall Troop Rebate Available Online Now

Did you know that all purchases made at the Girl Scout Shop September 1st through November 30th will earn your troop a rebate to use at the Girl Scout Shop if you sign up for the Fall Troop Rebate? Five percent of all purchases made (online and in-store) when you sign up for the Fall Troop Rebate will be returned to your troop as a certificate in the begining of January. This certificate can be used in the Girl Scout shop until the end of February. Sign-up your troop online anytime before November 30th to earn your rebate on all purchases made after September 1st through November 30th.

Troop leaders can sign-up their troop to be a part of the Fall Troop Rebate program by simply clicking here.

Stylish hoodies, sweaters, leggings, sweatshirts, sweats, plaid shirts, rugby shirts and long-sleeved t-shirts will keep them both fashionable and warm this season, while the cute new Girl Scout bracelets and watches will help accesorize their outfits. Our interns are especially fond of our newest fall fashion apparel and had a blast modeling it for our blog and website.

Don't forget that the Annual Sale is still happening, so come into the Girl Scout Shop anytime until September 30th to receive 20% off on all regularly priced apparel for girls, teens, and adults (when you spend $25 or more). Excludes official uniform vests, sashes, tunics, and clearance items. After the annual sale, outerwear will continue to be 20% off until October 15th.

"How I Spent My Summer Vacation" by Troop 1107

For their last hurrah before school started, Lincoln Girl Scouts Cadette Troop 1107 took an extended trip to the coastal town of Santa Cruz. In Girl Scouts, an extended trip requires advanced planning, which the girls did during the spring and summer months before taking off to the beach. Paperwork, budgeting, meal planning, grocery shopping and mapping routes are just a few of the details that needed addressing before the girls could gain permission from Council to hit the road. Once they were given permission, it was "Santa Cruz, here we come!" The girls spent three nights at the Santa Cruz Hostel, a beautiful Victorian multi-building complex just two short blocks from the Boardwalk. They slept dormitory-style, and prepared and ate most of their meals in beautifully-equipped kitchen and dining room accommodations. Among the highlights of their trip were the carnival rides on the Boardwalk (of course!) a trip to the nearby Mystery Spot, a day at the beach, and a fancy dinner out at a lovely Wharf restaurant. Not only did Troop 1107 have loads of fun, but they also learned the importance of planning ahead and being prepared for the unexpected while away from home. Now, as seasoned travelers, they are also eager to share their experiences with other troops who might be interested in planning an extended trip of their own. What a great way to spend your summer vacation! Go Girl Scouts!

How to Spend Cookie Credits

A mom from troop 1352 wrote in and said, "We are very grateful to be in a Girl Scout troop and have an awesome troop leader. As a Girl Scout mom I have learned different ways for the girls to use their cookie credits. For example, in 2008 the troop earned enough credits to renew our season passes to Monterey Bay Aquarium. Before we renewed our season passes we got to go scuba diving in 38-degree water! We didn't dive in the ocean with all the sharks and animals, we were able to dive in the ocean tide pool. This is a moment we will never forget. Also, we got to go behind the scenes to feed the fish, stingrays, etc., and learned a little about each animal like where they came from and how old they are."

We Might Be Looking For You!

We are looking for all recipients of the highest Girl Scout Award


As we prepare for our 100th anniversary in 2012, we want to recognize local women who achieved the highest award in Girl Scouts at a council-wide celebration. We want to highlight achievers, but we need to find these past recipients of our highest award. If you, or your advisor, or leader, know of anyone who is a past award winner, please copy and paste the form below into an e-mail and e-mail your answers to us at marcomm@girlscoutshcc.org.





Name of Past Award Winner:


E-mail:


Address:


Phone:





Years in Girl Scouts ______ - _______





Award Achieved & Year


_________ Golden Eaglet 1916 - 1919


_________ Golden Eaglet of Merit 1919 - 1939


_________ First Class Rank 1933 - 1963


_________ Curved Bar Award 1940 - 9163


_________ First Class Award 1963 - 1980


_________ Girl Scout Gold Award 1980 - 2010

Woman of Worth

L'Oreal Paris is celebrating woman of worth and their iconic philosophy "Because You're Worth It" by selecting ten honorees who will receive $5,000 for their cause - with one of them receiving an additional $25,000. L'Oreal Paris will also donate $5,000 to the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund in recognition of each honoree.

This is a perfect opportunity to nominate a Girl Scout that you know. The deadline to nominate someone is July 9.

For more information click here www.girlscoutshcc.org/gshccadmin/site1/girlscouts/girlscouts/ambassadorLinks_scholarships.asp

The Japanese Experience

The Japanese Experience is a Girl Scout day camp that gives girls the opportunity to learn about the Japanese culture through songs, games, tradition cuisine and crafts. The day camp ran from June 8 through June 12, and on Friday, June 11, for the first year, the day camp presented Koya San Spirit of Children Taiko Group, a Japanese drum group with 35 members 7 years old and older. Girl Scouts were able to participate in drumming after a few songs from the group.

Goooo Sirens

Troop 845 was invited by the Sacramento Sirens Woman's Football Team to be the Color Guard at their last regular season home game. Check out the photos below of troop 845 on the Sirens' home field.

What did you do on Memorial Day Weekend?

Junior Girl Scout troop 845 of Maidu Creek Service Unit put white crosses and flags on two sections of the Veterans laid to rest in the Sunset Lawn Chapel of Chimes Cemetery in Sacramento. Several of the girls have family members in this cemetery that are Veterans, so it was very special. This is the third year the girls in this troop have done this.

To submit what you and your troop did e-mail us at marcomm@girlscoutshcc.org

National Emergency Responders Thank You Day!

Troop 1157 surprised some of the Tracy fire fighters last night to say "Thank You" for National Emergency Responders Thank You Day. The fire fighters had never heard of National Emergency Responders Thank You Day, but thought it was so cool that the Girl Scouts were helping to promote the idea. Here are a few pictures of the troop with the fire fighters. The girls were so excited to participate in this event, and the fire fighters were very grateful.

One Girl can Make a Difference

One Junior Girl Scout named Isabel has been working hard everyday to make the world a better place. She has been working on several recycling projects that have spread to her household, school and community.

Isabel is collecting old shoes to donate to Nike's Reuse-A-Shoe program. This program prevents old shoes from ending up in the landfill, and the shoes are instead turned into a raw material that can be used to make local running tracks, zippers or soles for new shoes.

She started her recycling adventure by recycling juice pouches for two cents each and donating the money to her sister's Daisy troop. With juice pouches alone she raised $124 for her sister's troop.

Kids at Isabel's school, and now her sister's school, have begun to donate their shoes, and recyclable items, to her cause. She also makes regular stops at sandwich shops to collect chip bags to recycle.

All proceeds are donated to Girl Scouts and Placer Hills Education Foundation.

If you want to help you can drop off used athletic shoes at Sierra Hills School, 16505 Placer Hills Road in Meadow Vista or Weimar Hills School, 200 W. Weimar Crossroads through April 30.

Harriet Antonides, resident of Eskaton Village in Roseville, turned 100 years old on April 5, 2010, and as a new member of Eskaton's centenarian club, she will participate in their "Thrill of a Lifetime" program by becoming a Girl Scout, which has been her lifelong dream.

To give Harriet the full Girl Scout experience, we put on a vintage Girl Scout uniform fashion show, demonstrated a Girl Scout color guard ceremony and held an investiture ceremony where she was presented her sash and membership pin.

To read more click here...

Girl Scout Cookies for the Soldiers

Thousands of Girl Scout Cookies were donated during this year's cookie season and are now on their way to soldiers overseas. Girl Scout troops like 2030 have worked hard to encourage people from the community to purchase cookies as a donation to the troops overseas because two of the girls in the GS troop have brothers in the war. Many of the cookie boxes donated had hand written messages on them, and the council had a place on the web site to write a message to be placed on the cookie boxes. During the cookie season GS troops from the council area sold boxes of cookies to people who donated them to the soldiers. These boxes were recently picked up by the National Guard who ensured they were shipped out.

Thank you to everyone who donated cookies to the soldiers during this cookie season and all the troops and troop leaders that worked so hard.

Cookies - They're Back!

I was driving through Citrus Heights this week and stopped at a red light behind an RT bus. On the back of the bus was the Girl Scout Cookie advertisement “They’re Back!” It made me smile. I love Girl Scout Cookies! I love everything about them! It’s no surprise that I’m the cookie manager for our troop. I’m also the mother of twin Brownies who typically want to sell a total of about 500 boxes to earn their desired incentive. At our house, early January through mid-March is all about Girl Scout Cookies!

At the beginning of January, we had a cookie kickoff party. We started our meeting by watching the Bakery Tour video from the ABC Smart Cookie website. This is a great video that showcases how Girl Scout cookies are made while sharing interesting facts and statistics about those cookies. After the video, I talked to the girls about safe selling. They gave me lots of good answers about staying safe while selling cookies. The ABC Smart Cookie website has a Cookie Activity Safety Guidelines flyer under the Volunteers-Training section of their website that is very helpful in teaching the girls that safety is the first priority.

In the spirit of all things cookie – we had a frosting party from Cookie Connection at the end of our meeting. Each girl got a plain sugar cookie and was able to frost and decorate it with her choice of colors and toppings. While the girls were busy creating their masterpieces, I went over the important details and paperwork with their parents.

At our troop meeting last Sunday our girls brainstormed to come up with ideas of how they’d like to spend the cookie money they earn this year. Some of their ideas included: a dinosaur museum, resident camp, Disneyland, ice skating, San Francisco, a fish hatchery, Six Flags and Apple Hill. After ruling out the ideas that were similar to things we had already done or were already in the works for the future, we settled on a trip to the snow!

I encourage our girls to set a personal goal based on the incentive they want to earn. Those incentives do a great job motivating our girls! The most desired incentives for our troop are the sitting plush frog, a movie ticket and the peace sign necklace! Additionally, I give each girl her sales number from last year to help set her goal for 2010. I encourage each girl to set a goal for herself that is a little higher than what she did last year.

The last thing our girls have to do this month (as far as cookies go) is complete the Catch GOALS! activity on the ABC Smart Cookie website. My daughters entered their personal sales goals and used online marketing tools to send e-mails to family & friends. Just a note, if your girl enters her goal by the end of January then updates it before cookie sales are over, she can earn a special patch!

We’re looking forward Mega Drop cookie pick up event on February 13th! In the meantime, we’re still taking orders and working towards our personal and troop goals!

~MM

Girl Scout Cookie Song

The ideas for this song came about when my daughter, D'Auna, and I were discussing her sales pitch for the 2010 Girl Scout Cookie campaign. She is a bit shy but she loves to sing, so I thought she would be less apprehensive about singing her sales pitch. D'Auna and I brainstormed ideas for a while, and then a light bulb came on. As we stared at the pictures of the various Girl Scout Cookies we figured out a way to creatively fit the names of the cookies into a song and thus the Girl Scout Cookie Song/Poem was born!

D'Auna preformed the song for various family members and friends as her sales pitch. She sold 256 boxes during pre-sales this year! She is still selling cookies with this song and is becoming more comfortable preforming and speaking in front of a crowd. My little Daisy Scout is proud to have sold so many boxes of Girl Scout Cookies during her first cookie season. I am proud of the fact that she is developing confidence and public speaking skills that will have a lasting influence on her life, all thanks to Girl Scouts...and a cute little song!

Guest Blogger Sylvia