September & October with the Pathfinders

Our year started off at the end of August with a barbeque and planning session. We made chicken and veggie kebabs, baked potatoes and chocolate brownies. Our first formal meeting was held on September 11th and was spent planning activities and meals for camp. At the next meeting, we went grocery shopping for camp and talked about last-minute camp preparation and up-coming meetings.

Our third meeting was devoted to the 'We're A Team' module and learning to work together

as a group. We did a number of team challenges and Minute to Win It Games. Challenges included:

• Change Over - Ask the team to stand together on a tarp. Without stepping off the tarp, players must turn the tarp over completely and remain standing on the tarp the entire time. Repeat with a smaller tarp.
• Everybody Up - Hold hands in a circle, with feet pressed against the feet of the people on either side. While keeping hands clasped and feet together, the whole group must sit down on the ground. Then stand up again!
• Pass the Can - Players sit in a circle with a coffee can on one player's foot. Tell players to pass the can around the circle using only their feet. If the can falls to the ground, they must start over.
• All Aboard - Spread out a cloth or tarp in front of the group. When "All Aboard" is called, everyone is to get both feet on the tarp (platform). Once this is done, everyone steps off the platform. The tarp is then folded in half and the actions repeated. Continue until the group is unable to get everyone onto the platform.

October started off with a meeting on "Cookies, Code of Conduct and Choosing Your Own Direction" to cover the Cookies Rising and Choosing Your Own Direction Modules. Two of the activities we did were re-writing the Promise in text and designing Cookie Selling brochures with tips for Sparks and Brownies.

At our second meeting in October we celebrated the International Day of the Girl. We learned about what the Day of the Girl is and about The Girl Effect. Activities included "Who Are the Lucky Ones?", "How is the World Divided?" (from the Equitas Play It Fair Toolkit), and "Minefield". Each girl then completed a postcard answering the question "We need girls in the lead because..."

Our next meeting was a Board Game Night. We played Twister, Checkers and Taboo, as well as active games - Blob Tag, Fetch, Arches, and Duck, Duck, Goose.

We participated in the annual Cookie Day at Sears on October 19th where we teamed up with the Rangers to sell 6 cases of Spring cookies and 14 cases of Fall cookies.

Our October 23rd meeting was "The Arts From A to Z" module. We started off with two drama games - "Emotion Actions" (charades with emotions) and "Imagination Walks" (moving in a certain way - i.e. walking as if you were on the moon, as if your pinky finger weighed 100 pounds). Next we went on to dance, with girls sharing steps from the different types of dance they have taken. Keira shared the "Coffee Grinder" from Hip Hop, Lynsey shared "Jazzy Blues" from Jazz, Taylor shared steps from Highland and Meaghan shared "Laundry" from Hip Hop. Then we moved onto music, with people sharing their favourite songs and music genres. Our final activity was crafting, making beaded spiral bracelets using coiled wire and small beads.

The last meeting of October was a Hallowe'en Party. We had a wide variety of costumes - a Pathfinder, a Hockey Fan, a Gummy Bear, a Scarecrow, a Devil, a Zombie, a Nerd and an 80s Rock Star. We made two edible crafts - Lollipop Ghosts (lollipop covered with a napkin tied under the lollipop and a face drawn on) and Dead Surgeon's Hands (plastic glove [mine were blue] with candy corn in the fingers as nails and then filled with caramel corn). We also shaved balloons (cover inflated balloon with shaving cream and try to shave with a plastic knife without popping the balloon) - very, very messy! We created toilet paper mummies, and layed "Pin the Tail on the Zombie Unicorn". The evening ended with snacks and drinks.