Zoe Goes to France

Our first scheduled meeting for 2017 was cancelled due to the weather, so we started back on January 17th with our annual 'Zoe' Challenge. This year, we traveled with Zoe to France!

We had our usual opening ceremony, followed by an active game, and then the 3rd Year Guides and our Pathfinder went off to plan a party for the Chinese New Year. 

Our first activity was to learn a bit about Guiding in France. We found out that there are 5 separate organizations(!) who are represented in WAGGGS by a federation called Scoutisme Français. Download "Guiding in France" (pdf)

We then moved on to an active game - Boules, which is similar to Lawn Bowling or Bocci Ball. Boules is played between teams of up to four players on grass or dirt. We had to make some modifications to the game, and played with two teams of four girls each (with larger groups, set up more than one game). For each game, you will need a coloured ball (the cochonnet) and 2 balls per player (the boules). We used brightly coloured foam balls for our cochonnets and newspaper to make our own boules. The cochonnet is placed at one end of the playing area, the players stand at the opposite end. Players take turns throwing their boules towards the cochonnet. They may try to knock other players boules away from the cochonnet. Play continues until everyone has thrown their boules. The team with the closest boule to the cochonnet wins the round. They receive one point for each of their boules that is closer than the other teams. (For example, if Team A has 3 boules closest to the cochonnet before there is one from Team B, Team A would score 3 points.)

After we cleared up from our game, we explored French Art. A set of Powerpoint slides were used to show examples of different types of art:

• Rococo - Usually shows outdoor activities, such as picnics, happy couples and people relaxing
• Neo-classicism - Imitates the art themes and styles of the ancient Greeks and Romans
• Impressionism - Makes use of light and includes many outdoor works - landscapes, seascapes, forestscapes
• Post-Impressionism - Like impressionism, but becomes blockier, more defined
• Cubism - Focuses on shape and tries to show all sides of a three-dimensional object in two dimensions
• Raw Art - Makes use of bold lines, simple colours and may resemble a jigsaw puzzle

We then had a go at designing our own raw art. Download "French Art" (pdf)

We ended our meeting by sampling some French Butter Cookies (biscuits au beurre) and closed with a campfire and Taps.

1 3/4 cups Flour

1/4 cup Sugar

1 1/4 cup Butter

1 1/2 tsp Vanilla

Nutmeg

Beat butter and vanilla until creamy. Sift in flour and sugar. Refrigerate, if necessary, until firm enough to roll into balls. Roll into 1" balls, place on an ungreased cookie tray, flatten slightly with a fork. Sprinkle with nutmeg. Bake at 375⁰F for 6-10 minutes, or until golden on the edges.