Bear Bahoochie

Legoland rocks!

I went down to Legoland with friends this week and it was great. Even better I saw Lego versions of my favourite things!

Weekend Reading

Two books read over the weekend; Jill, The Lone Guide by Ethel Talbot was written in the 1930s I think. It was really interesting as the girl couldn’t go to a local unit due to distance – 6 miles! Anyway she was a trooper and didn’t let that get her down or the run of bad luck she suffered instead with a song in her heart and positive thought she turned it round to a wonderful happy ending where everything not only worked out but was tied up with a pretty bow! It’s a great read and talks about a unit of Sea Guides and how although a lone she surrounded by all the girls who are members of the organisation.

Lone Guides still exit (in fact I’m a Lone Guider for Senior Section in Scotland) find out more here.

The second book was the third in the Heather Wells Mystery series by Meg Cabot – Size Doesn’t Matter (aka Big Boned in the USA.)

It was fun – another murder in the halls leave ex-pop star Heather trying hard not to get involved but being dragged in anyway. Away from the job her latest man is keen for her to get healthy and convinces her to go jogging before work. Funny and fun it was very enjoyable and although I had worked out who committed the murder sooner than Heather I sure didn’t see the reason.

Crafty Newsletter

This months Lones newsletter is all about craft and the envelope ended up being more crafty than I expected. I failed miserably to buy A5 envelopes or bring home the A4 ones I keep stored at work so instead I had to come up with a envelope – a recycled Hello! magazine came to the rescue.To finish off I added white sticker labels to the front for the address and I even made a little seal for the back – roughly drawn trefoil with ‘Lones Newsletter’ written around it

Camp badge – back again!

The time has come for the SS100 badge to be designed. This year it’s on the West Coast but it’s main thing is to mark the 100 years of Girlguiding. So the badge was to reflect this (say goodbye to my puffin plan). I decided to limit the options a lot more this year – one badge design but the busyness and colour will have to be discussed with the badge maker. Partly because I don’t have the official centenary colours as pens and partly because the size is supposed to be the same as the past years to it’s tiny.

In response to queries:
This badge is not made up yet it is being made for participants at SS100 so until that event is done (Sept) there won’t be any spares. For more info on SS100 see http://www.girlguidingscotland.org.uk
The badge has had to be changed as I expected and it has to my knowledge lost the stars, spots and streamers in the background and the lettering has been changed to match centenary colours. I haven’t seen the final version however so that is based on third party discussions.

Camp Blanket

Camp blankets and badges are serious things in the world of Guiding and Scouts. Despite my involvement for the past twenty years it’s only in the last two that I’ve made the camp blanket (hand sewn of course).

I was asked about what badge is my favourite – this one is

I’d love it to be deep an meaningful but a lion eating an oreo is really all it is (well the cookie says ’78 and that is when I appeared on the earth).

Dinah meets Dinah

I was at a Guiding event in Edinburgh the other week and I have a travelling bear (part of the centenary fun) anyway I made said bear a green beanie hat and a green sling bag. Though more excitingly from a Guiding perspective was that the bear is named Dinah after the current Scottish Chief Guide and at the event I finally met the real Dinah and  so did the bear

100 years of Girlguiding

I went to the centenary launch today was was modelling my Shrink Plastic charm bracelet. Simple to do just trace promise badges onto shrink plastic, cut them out, punch holes in them and shrink!

Shrink Plastic fun

For a Senior Section craft I was making a charm bracelet using Shrink Plastic.

I had some spare so I decided to make myself a pair of jigsaw earrings to wear at Capital Jig in October.

I used 2mm link chain. I picture makes them look much darker than they really are – I used crayola metalic pens to colour in the jigsaw peices.

Guiding History

I just read “The Story of The Girl Guides in Scotland: 1908 -2000″ by Elizabeth Robertson.

It’s easy to read, interesting and informative though a tad erratic in it’s inclusion policy.  My favourite facts were:

The girl pictured here is Allison Cargill who was the first girl in Scotland to attempt Girl Scouting. She joined in with a local Scout troop and her and her friends called themselves the Cuckoo Patrol.

Senior Section first appeared in 1916 in Scotland (known as Senior Guides).

Lones in Scotland first appeared in 1919 (though apart from a couple of camp references and a couple of Queen’s Guides little mention is made).

The original cooks badge required you to either skin and cook a rabbit or pluck, truss and cook a chicken.

The first Scottish Commissioner (known at the time as Deputy Chief Commissioner) was Loelia Buchan-Hepburn – she was 19 when she took on the role.

Senior Section Camp Badge Part 3

Tragically the highland cow logo is too close to Aberdeen Uni’s Student logo apparently. So the thistle wins.