Happy Boxes

24/04/13

This evening was yet another Big Brownie Birthday night. We have two activities to go until most of the girls can have their badge.

We had two new girls join tonight, one who was the younger sister of a girl who's just left to go to Guides and the other who knew a few girls from school but not well. She seemed a little bit nervous at first but, once she'd been introduced to her sixer who looked after her all evening, she seemed to get into it and enjoyed herself.

We started off with our usual show-and-tell and circle. Brown Owl then briefly explained to them the new handbooks and how we were going to change the sticker charts slightly but, if they were in the middle of an old badge, they could finish it before moving onto the new ones. They seemed a little confused but eventually I think most of them understood what was going on. We then explained the craft for the evening and got them started.

This evening we were doing one of the compulsory activities from the BBB which entailed them making a 'happy box' which they can take home and fill with things that make them happy (photos, tickets, objects etc.). Brown Owl went out and bought mini packs of cereals so they could all have a box. She left the cereals in them which she then said they could eat during the meeting. In hindsight, this was possibly not the best idea as we ended up with cereals all over the floor! I got some girls to sweep up the biggest mess except when one girl handed the dustpan to her friend, the whole lot was spilt again and then stood in accidentally! We put out all the foam, paper and stickers we have in the cupboard for the girls to help themselves to. I spent most of the evening circulating around the tables, wrapping boxes in paper as the girls were struggling a little bit but, other than that, they just got on with their decorating and I caught up with our Guide and Young Leader.

We then played the butterfly game which we ran out of time to play in a previous meeting. We cut the butterflies the girls had coloured in in half. Brown Owl got the girls to spread the left halves of the butterflies around on the floor and then she gave the right halves to the Leaders. Each sixer was given 3 right halves too and, as a six, they had to find the other half of their butterfly and take it to a Leader who would give them another one to find. We spread out around the room and gave the girls the go ahead. I think they forgot about me at one point because they were all running around, trying to find more halves of butterflies (all the other Leaders had given away theirs) and completely missed me standing at the side of the room. Brown Owl had caught my eye and knew there were more left so didn't call a halt to the game but then they got confused as to where the remaining right halves were! They noticed me in the end but we still ended up with 2 left over left halves on the floor when they all said they were done..!

This was a fairly relaxed evening as they were all working independently so we didn't have much to do.