Thinking Day (with a touch of extra thinking)

So it was the Thinking Day event at the church today. From previous posts you may remember that we were to make salt dough characters and waffles in the theme of Norway. On  that note that did happen, but my, was it a struggle to get there!?

We actually met last night in preparation for this evenings event- so everything was pre-made minus the ingredients for the waffles- as those were to be fresh. However one thing that my Senior section weren't relying on happening was for their leader (ie me) being 30 mins late. The reason being, the amount of thinking that needs to be done for my Thesis.

I met today with my thesis tutor after handing in approximately 4,000 words. Baring in mind that this was the word deadline for December, so I'm a little behind. The tutorial was set to be half an hour long yet my poor tutor had to talk to me for an hour, half of the time trying to calm down my panic and the other half trying to explain everything that he was saying in metaphors. The end result of this tutorial was- you have 3 weeks. You better get it done. So yes i am panicking now, and i have consequently erased any plans i have over the next couple of weeks to get it done.However this very kind gift of an extra half an hour tutorial wasn't very good for my guides. I tried texting a couple of people on the way back to say i was going to be late but unfortunately no one seemed to get them so none of my instructions were followed and  i just got to the church in to a different state of panic.

Me panicking

100 girls aged 5-16. My Senior section were brilliant this evening though, each time we had a group, one manned the dough while the other made waffles which allowed me time to explain to them what they were doing and why it was Norwegian. It got a little hectic trying to keep the younger ones away from the waffle iron but no one burnt themselves (well, apart from me) which was great. The risk assessment was obviously very worth it!

I think the girls all enjoyed themselves in the end and i think the event went really well over all- there were about 10 country's for the girls to walk around and a personal achievement for us was that we made our activity less than 20p per head per child. I thought that was impressive anyway. The evening ended with us all renewing our guide promises together, in the good old fashioned 'tea light' scenario, which seems really boring but really determines a community within a town. Over a hundred people in a room that you can associate yourself with and talk to, without even considering the parents of the children. Its a lot of people, and it gives you a bit of hope that not everywhere is so socially isolating.

Norway Prep

I've just finished writing my risk assesment form for the event tomorrow at guides. Basically we are only making salt dough characters (from: The three billy goats gruff) and eating waffles but my risk assesment has made the task sound like mission imposible. Death is an option, but you would have to eat all of the salt dough you are given - oh and only if no one calls an ambulance.
The prep went well this evening though and it looks as if everything is 'salted' for tomorrow (ha ha ha- that is a reference to the salt dough) Should be fun, all i need to find now is a stamp in my room that symbolises Norway enough to put in the childrens passport. I think i only have Christmas theamed ones and a three goats book. I'm also taking my slr tomorrow, one of the senior section is a hotography student so i'm going to utilise her skills.
I have enjoyed the last couple of weeks of senior section- I think the senior section feel a little more familiar with me and on my part more regularity isn't a bad thing, i need to learn to communicate a little better and everything will be fine; i think its also helped that i have had an activity to do the last couple of weeks to keep us occupied. I'm going to have to start thinking about some new and interesting things to do with them.

Senior Section and a very crafty Norway

Next week there is a guiding event going on in our district to mark Thinking Day (For those of you that was ever in the Brownies, its that day where you light a tea light candle and think of different countries)- 100 brownies and rainbows are going to have a 'passport' and  travel around several countries, ran by the leaders/ senior section- each country has to have a craft based around their country, another idea around this event was to try and mix the groups a bit- so a little bit of cross generational teamwork. Our country is Norway, seemingly convenient after having gone to Norway, however the crafts that i found were extremely difficult to do. We spent about an hour trying to construct a paper weaved basket (maybe not the best idea for 5-10 year olds). In the end we came up with making Vaffels and whilst the kids are waiting to make them they can play with some salt dough (making some trolls, and idea from Ellie which i am very grateful for). Lots of preparation. I'm back to guides again on Tuesday to set up and make lots of Norwegian flags!

Meetings

I managed to get to Rainbows this evening- it was quite lucky, as the one of the leaders couldn't make it- the unit can only really run with two otherwise our ratios are out. I think there has to be 1 adult to every 5 children, which can be tricky, especially as everyone has to be CRB checked nowadays. When i was in Brownies, guides etc, the mums could just come and help out no problem- much easier, and there was never any cause for cancelling meetings because of staff shortage. It does make things a little difficult, especially as it is at an awkward time and it is a voluntary position, people just aren't able to volunteer anymore.
Anyway, rainbows was fun- we did some colouring in- which i was quite pleased about, although i didn't get to do one of my own; i was told by one of the rainbows that i had to help colour hers in- because it was going to be be a big job!
After Rainbows i quickly ran home for some dinner to then follow on to a District meeting to discuss plans, fundraising, that kind of thing, its a little sad though, because i know with college i just wont be able to go to half of these things; we did discuss doing something for Thinking Day, as it is a large guiding tradition. we all had to pick a country for our groups. I chose Norway off the top of my head for the senior section, presuming that i would know how to do a craft as such. Could be a little more difficult than i thought...
I was also supposed to be going back to London this evening, having a seminar tomorrow morning- but the meeting went on a little longer than expected- when i said that i needed to get home, i think i was misunderstood, there was a reply of "we all need to get home tonight"- i don't think that people have caught on that i don't live in Harold Wood anymore.

Being behind

This blog is about exactly what it says on the tin. I'm behind in lots of things- I had my first thesis tutorial yesterday which went quite well considering i handed in something that was very ambiguous and incomplete, he gave me some advice about thinking about why i was writing the essay and how i should think about artists intention more from a human perspective. I think the discussion just generally calmed my nerves about it. but he gave me another hand in date for a couple of weeks time to get everything up to scratch.
The Catalogue was supposed to be sent to print on Monday, but after talking to the printers Nick found out that i had been given the wrong quote for what i wanted and it was actually going to cost twice as much. Nick is working on negotiations...
Finally, I went to senior section last night for our second meeting and only one girl turned up. When questioned if i had told them when the meeting was, i replied with yes- i sent an e-mail to everyone and set up a face book page, face book messaged, and for the girl that doesn't have Internet access, i sent a text. I don't think there was much more i could do to be honest. Hopefully I'm going to try and arrange a meeting for the week after next. It will be quite difficult to arrange it around college though. It was quite frustrating tonight because i had to come all the way back to Essex from London for nothing, and of course there is the fare to pay. I just wish they had said they couldn't make it.

Senior Section

After camping with the guides the other week, i got into talking with one of the guide leaders about how it is apparent that a Senior section is needed in the local area, a couple of the girls on the camp wanted to continue with guiding but, were quite a lot older than the ones that had recently joined the group. It was something that i was interested in taking up last year, but nothing ever came out of it. I think the main problem being that commuting last year left me worn out and time-less. Hopefully this year, living in London, commuting out of London once a month wont be such a problem.
I went to normal guides session tonight to present the idea of there being a senior section, unfortunately there were only three people there that are eligible to move up a group. I bought in my laptop with a DVD explaining what it was about (To be honest I'm not even sure myself what is supposed to go on in the senior section at all) the DVD suggests that it will be packed with trips around the world and awards but there isn't anything to suggest what is supposed to be happening in a monthly meet up. I did have a chat with a lady in the girl guiding head office in London who was quite helpful. What she said was that the Senior Section was about a number of things, but mainly about understanding social responsibility (moving onto being a brownie leader etc) and having peer support through exams and leaving school, basically somewhere to have a bit of fun and chat. A lot of the projects like the duke of Edinburgh award and the queen guide award are to be done on their own- with my support in organising things and talking about how to do it. My initial ideas are to maybe arrange a trip every other month that is concerned with one of the girls personal interests, so as a group the girls get to learn more about each other and then in between these trips just have sessions to talk about what people are doing and to give help with organising time, and the guiding projects/ exams.
Its early days though, and it all comes down to the amount of girls interested in coming on a regular basis- which directly links to the amount of funding for trips etc- there are still guiding fees to pay.