Ideas for Service Unit Events

Surprise Breakfast - Leaders got permission from parents to come early
Saturday morning (6:30 a.m.) and get girls in their pajamas for a surprise
pancake breakfast.  Held at the school.  Had music and games until 9:00.

Roller Skating/food drive - The roller rink was reserved for scouts only one
weekday afternoon.  In addition to the cost of admission, each scout/skater
brought along some food for the food bank.

Badge days - We have done a couple science badges in our service unit as a
badge workshop.  Our council sponsors the 2 horse badges (Horse Lover and
Horseback Rider) as all-day sessions.  Girls receive the badge at the end of
the day.

Craft Fair - Several tables are set up with different crafts, and girls spend
so many minutes at each table making that craft, then they rotate.  Some
crafts from the past have been--decorating small clay flower pots with
decopage, layering colored salt in small glass bottles, putting candy corn in
the fingertips of a clear plastic glove then filling with popcorn, barrettes
decorated with balloons which are tied to the barrette, clear glass ornaments
decorated, clothespin reindeer ornaments.

Swim Party - Local pool is reserved on a Friday night just for scouts.
Lifeguards are provided when renting the pool.  Then the girls come from 8-10
p.m. and play.  Troops that wish to work on their "Swimming" badge are allowed
to use pool equipment, such as life vests and rescue rings.

An event I hope to see some day is a Hawaiian event.  The Girl Scout Council
of Hawaii puts out a book on how to do things (the promise in Hawaiian, how to
have a luau, make a lei or a volcano, games, etc.), and they have a patch that
is awarded upon completion of so many activities.  Looks like a lot of fun!

There are also lots of opportunities to use scout holidays for events, such as -

Juliette Low's birthday (Oct. 31) and the Girl Scout birthday (March 12).
Many of us are trying to get away from Halloween's ghosts and goblins, so
having a party for our J.Low gives us a chance to focus on other things.
You could have bobbing for apples or donuts on a string, cake walk (or cupcake
walk!), bowling, some kind of fall craft, etc.  Plus birthday cake!

How about a quiz show event?  Each troop chooses a real or made up show.
You have three rotations. One, the troop host two other troops playiing  each
other. tthe other two periods they play two games.  Keep age level together if
you have enough troops.  My sister's SU did this and she said the girls loved
it.  I hoop to do it someday also.  If you are really interested I can give some more info.

Laura Inglass Wilder patch program that would be teriffic for an event.
A little house on the prarie (sp) theme.

A mother - daughter lock in with hair and make-up tips

A father -daughter sock hop - favorite fella (over 18) dance - this year we will have a 70's theme

Annual leader- daughter weekend camping

Family picnic - with games and door prizes

Flashlight egg hunt
Night Hike (with fun stations like jumping rope, reading a compass, etc.)
Haunted Hut
Surprise overnight kidnapping
Bicycle rodeo
Scouts on Parade (singing cadences, songs, etc.)
Bed races (each troop designs and makes their own bed - leaders, parents
Push while the girls are on the bed) need a large parking lot!
Animal calls pageant (different catagory's for pig, dog, sheep, cow,etc)
Circus of Scouts (make a 3-ring circus and the girls team up and put on
acts, some dressing as the animals, or trainers, etc.)

November ( Drive-In Movie Night featuring Pollyanna)
November ( Cinderella Ball (Father/Daughter) Girls dressing up in their best,
some are renting Cinderella costumes - going to be held at an area mansion,
music, dancing. horsdeovres (sp?) and pictures taken of dad and daughter

January (Cookie Ralley the night before cookie sale starts, stations will be
set up to watch the video, etc)

February (Sock Hop - back to the 50's)

April  - (Brownie Lock-In and Junior Lock-in same night different locations)

May - (County-wide Camporee)

JGL Birthday Bash=3D cake decorating, games (Brownies earned their Play
try-it), and songs, learned a dance (the Cadettes completed the Service
Project part of the Invitation to Dance IPP).

Valentine Father/Daughter Dance

JGL (Birthday) Mardi Gras celebrations with Mardi Gras theme, costume party.

Songfest - a song leader who taught the girls different GS songs.

Native American Indian Culture local tribe came and shared their culture with the girls.

Sept: Mother Goose Party -- D/B/J - The girls brought a book to donate to
the local children's shelter. We played games, sang songs, talked about JGL
and who she was.  We made friendship bead pins (safety pins) and had a flag
design contest for the service unit.  We also provided a snack. This was
billed as a service project. (We are not doing this event this year.)

Nov: Mother-Daughter -- All levels - Last year we did a M/D Social. We had
everyone bring a *sack* lunch and had them all decorate their *sack*.  Then
we had each troop bring a gift for the *best dressed box/sack*.  We had
several different categories. We had 2 adults and 3 girls do the judging
(they each got to wear a special sticker indicating that they were *judges*)
Then everyone ate lunch.  Afterwards, everyone sat at the craft tables and
made at least one puzzle piece pin.  We had buttons, puzzle pieces, feathers
and googlie eyes available. (This was last year's event.)

Nov: Father-Daughter -- All levels - This year we are having our Father
Daughter in the fall.  We are doing a Cinderella Ball (I got the idea from
the list).  We are having a DJ come in and do the music, and I am working on
getting one of my favorite restaurants to cater the event.  It's going to be
billed as a sort of *prom* night type thing, with formal or semi-formal
attire.

Dec: We let the troops do their own thing for the holidays, although our
Leader Meeting is moved to my home for a holiday pot luck dinner and fun.

Jan: Cookie Kickoff Dinner -- All levels - We had a spaghetti dinner last
year and then did the training with all the girls present.  We had a really
good turn out and will be doing this from now on.  We used to do a breakfast
but have found that it was difficult to keep the pancakes hot for over 100
girls in line.

Feb: Father/Daughter Social -- All levels - Last year we had a skating party
at the local roller rink....poor participation. Changing to Cinderella Ball
this year (see Nov.).  The year before it was a Sock Hop....good turn out.

Mother/Daughter Memories -- All levels - This year our Mother/Daughter is
going to be a book scraping party with probably a pot luck dinner.  I'm
trying to get the owner of a local scrape booking store to come out and get
everyone started.  We will be asking them to each bring with them 3-5
pictures of the same subject/topic and get them started off on one or two
pages.  This will happen in the spring this year.

Mar: Passport to the World -- All levels - We used to do this every year.
Each troop picks a WAGGGS country and prepares a booth for that country,
complete with posters, and some type of food prepared and some give away of
some sort.  This year we are changing it to reflect the cultural diversity
of our Service Unit.  We don't have all the details worked out yet, but each
troop will choose a culture and we will probably have one topic for each
culture to be researched (ie, weddings, funerals, birthdays, special holidays, etc.)

Apr: Teddy Bear Picnic -- All levels - This is our other service project of
the year. We have each of the troops collect stuffed animals, bring them to
a local park.  We also ask them to bring a sack lunch.  After everyone has
their lunch, we have a *ceremony* where we have each girl, starting with the
Daisies on up to the highest level we have at the Picnic, place their
animal(s) into the back seat of a police car.  After the *donationing* is
completed, we play different types of games.  This last year we also had an
ice cream social.

Leader/Daughter Appreciation -- All leaders and their daughters - This last
year we did a Tea Social.  We offered different types of hot tea and
cookies. We asked everyone to come with their own tea cups.  Some even
brought small tea pots and matching cups for their settings.  We socialized
over tea and cookies for a while (we also offered kool-aid for those that
did not drink tea).  Then we had some ceremonies and gave thank you
certificates to the girls and to the leaders.

May: Cadette/Senior Blow Out -- Cadettes and Seniors and Bridging Juniors -
Overnight party to celebrate all the hard work the girls did in the past
year.  We formed a committee with at least one representative from each
troop.  The girls did most of the planning. We started at 9pm and ended at
6am.  The girls are looking forward to doing it again this year.

Bridging:  We do have a Service Unit wide bridging ceremony from Daisies all
the way up.  Last year we had our very first Senior bridge to Leader....it
was cool!  We have a bridge and do it very simply.  We decorate it differently every year.

Me & My Guy Bowling Tournament(this was GREAT! Had prizes for highest scoring
dad, highest scoring scout, etc.)  Took the teams and made them a
combination of all different age groups with their dad.

Leader/Daughter Overnight - was held at a council camp.  Used their main
lodge.  It worked really great.  Did hiking, exploring, games, crafts, chat
time, on Sunday morning we had Mary Kay consultants come and do their makeup
and then we had a photographer come and do "Glamour Shots" of moms and
daughters.  They paid for their own pictures but it was really fun.  Each
troop sent food items for our meals.  This was in conjunction with Leader
Appreciation Day.  We sent letters to all 03's in each troop asking for
their assistance in doing this.

Leader Holiday Tea- held at a local antique store which has a tea room.  Did
coffee/dessert-each got to choose from their selection.  We did this
mid-December.  It was nice to be able to talk and sit and relax.