I Led a Group of Girls Up Big Boy and Nobody Died

Experiences as a Leader, Hikes & Outdoors No Comments big boy mountain, camp wabak, da-nice, hiking, juniors, outdoors, patches, samona, success, teamwork, troop 2562

About four or five years ago, I hiked up Big Boy at Camp WaBak for the first time. If you’re not familiar with the top of Big Boy, the view is magnificent, but there’s this sheer rock cliff that kind of gets your attention. Now, if you’re an adult, it would probably give you pause because you know better than to step out too far onto this granite face (at least for most adults). However, if you’re a Girl Scout leader like me, then you probably have nightmarish visions of girls tumbling off into the abyss.

This picture might give you an idea of what the rock cliff looks like:

So... yeah. — And right past that granite is a drop off. So… yeah.

October 25 2015

Junior Journey Weekend

Experiences as a Leader No Comments camp wabak, girl led, journeys, juniors, tips, troop 2562, troop stuff

Over the weekend, we traveled on a magical journey to the land of aMUSE where we discovered, connected, and took action! Well, not really….

FWIW, if you came across this post looking for a guide to do the aMUSE journey in a weekend or a day, you’re better off checking out a page like this. Or this. This blog post is only my experience with doing one and not necessarily HOW to do one. Continue reading

October 22 2015

Camp WaBak Weather

Hikes & Outdoors, Ideas No Comments camp wabak, weather

If you’d ever like to see what the weather is like as close to Camp WaBak as possible, ~~visit this personal weather station. It is located just on the other side of Big Boy Mountain.~~

Our Juniors and I are headed up there to knock out a Journey this weekend! I’ll post more about it at some point in the future.

Addendum 4/22/16: Apparently the weather station is no longer online, so use this one instead. It’s across the road from the entrance of Gap Creek Road.

October 20 2015

You So Cray-Cray!!

Random Things That Don't Fit Anywhere Else Kinda Like Me No Comments history, j-low, memes

Enough of the serious stuff like white papers and GSUSA! I’ll get back to them later. Let’s have some fun in the meantime.

Tonight I was cleaning up some of my old documents and came across one that had a list of J-Low quotes. Here’s my favorite one considering how we all struggle with trying to get volunteers:

When I returned to the States and wanted to start the Girl Scouts, I knew I needed some help. The first woman I approached tried to tell me she wasn’t interested. I pretended that my deafness prevented me from hearing her refusals. And told her, “Then that’s settled. I’ve told my girls you will take the meeting next Thursday.” I never heard a word of argument from her again!

Here’s the file that I scanned in! JGL Quotes Continue reading

October 18 2015

White Paper Hub Bub

National Governance, National Operations, Opinions 19 Comments 2004 restructure, core business strategy, councils, farthest north council, gsusa, j-low, leader issues, redcoat band, samona

Recently, a white paper written by the CEO of the Farthest North GS Council has been making the rounds on Facebook and volunteer discussion groups and is causing quite a stir among volunteers and apparently GSUSA alike. One particular FB group called “GSUSA, Are You Listening?” was apparently asked indirectly by GSUSA to remove the link to the white paper and has refused to do so.

I’ve also uploaded it: Reversing the Membership Decline in Girl Scouting While Regaining the Trust of the Membership and Movement (geez, that’s a long title)

This blog post will highlight some parts of the white paper along with my comments. If you haven’t read the white paper, then I highly suggest you do so at the very least, even if all four of five of you who read this blog aren’t interested in my ramblings. 😉 Continue reading

October 13 2015

Big Boy Mountain in the Fall

Hikes & Outdoors 3 Comments becky, big boy mountain, camp wabak, hiking, mountain magic, outdoors

I first attended Mountain Magic, our council’s leader weekend, back in October of 2011. Since then, there’s only been one other Mountain Magic. It’s either been skipped or canceled or flooded out. Contrary to my cynical guess, MM 2015 has been rescheduled in the spring. And wouldn’t you know it – I already have a previous commitment. But I digress into a very sore topic for me. Let me start over.

I first attended Mountain Magic, our council’s leader weekend, back in October of 2011. I had heard a lot about the Big Boy hike and how difficult it was. Well, I don’t back down from a challenge, so of course I signed up for the hike. At the time, I thought that was my first visit to Camp WaBak, but it turns out that was not the case. I don’t remember hiking up Big Boy, and I’m thinking that I probably would have remembered it if I had. Continue reading

October 7 2015

Printout Pet Peeve

Experiences as a Leader, National Operations 2 Comments gsusa, leader issues, pet peeves, printers

Here’s a pet peeve of mine (I got a million of ’em!) that’s kind of bothered me for a while. I didn’t really think of it as an issue for anyone other than me until a leader friend of mine said the same thing the other day.

GSUSA’s handouts and PDF downloads look great and are very attention-grabbing – for example, the new outdoor badges and requirements:

October 2 2015

I Found the Trip Out West Diary!

Reminiscing No Comments comics, marla, memories all alone in the moonlight, national center west, scrapbooks, trip out west, troop 20

By a stroke of serendipity, I found my Trip Out West™ diary while looking for something else. In fact, I found a bunch of my GS stuff while looking for something else. Funny how that works out.

Instead of unpacking from the canceled leader weekend, I typed this up to take my mind off my disappointment. So I present to you the diary of Amy Moore from 1987. Keep it mind it was written by a 13 (almost 14) year old at the time. It’s amazing the things I found interesting enough to comment about and the things I didn’t. ::shakes head:: My 42 year old comments are in [italic brackets]. Continue reading

October 2 2015

Llama Trek 2015!

Experiences as a Leader 2 Comments brownies, councils, eeyore, juniors, llamas, mountain magic, national center west, norcal council, patches, thumper, trips, troop 2562, troop stuff

Llama Face — Llama face, you’ve got the cutest little llama face….

This past weekend our GS troop visited Cosby, TN and the llamas (and one alpaca!) of Smoky Mountain Llama Trek. We had a great time. The gloomy clouds and drizzle broke apart once we got past Asheville, NC, and we had a great day.

So what is a llama trek, you ask? Well, basically you go hiking with a llama. You don’t ride them – they carry your stuff. We only went on a two mile hike, so there was nothing for them to carry. But each girl had her own llama (and our smallest Brownie her own alpaca), and we didn’t hear one “I’m tired” or “my feet hurt” complaint! So parents, if you don’t ever want to hear your child complain about walking, just get him or her a llama to divert her attention. Continue reading