My troop of 5 is currently in our second year of Brownies. The troop goal is to earn every badge that is offered in the Big Book. That means we have about 18 badges and 2 pins two earn this year, plus to journeys. It is almost enough to make my eye's twitch constantly.
At our meeting on Tuesday, we finished up work on our Potter badge. I am trying to separate the badges and do them in 2 weeks each.
The plan was for them to finish their beads, that we made out of oven bake clay. Then we were going to paint some plaster pumpkins and go for a short walk to find some pottery in the area.
But seldom do my plans actually happen the way that I want them too.
I started off by heading to Micheal's craft store. I knew from earlier in the summer that they had a whole section of plaster designs to paint, my daughter had picked out a owl and a gnome. I thought that they were bound to have some fall plaster items, after all it was just barely October. My co-leader had mentioned that she would like to paint pumpkins, and because we are working well together, I suggested plaster pumpkins.
I get to the store and they have nothing!
Ok not nothing, but the only option was ten dollar skull, which I a) didn't have enough money to purchase one for each girl and b) didn't think skulls were appropriate.
I send a frantic message to my co-leader, what do we do??
The small things that they do have is tree ornaments and snow men. We were not doing snow men in October.
After a half hour searching, I went with plaque ornaments.
Next up, we needed to turn the clay beads into key chains. This is totally out of my comfort zone. I can sew, crochet, decorate a cake, hot glue like a crazy person and draw, but jewelry not so much.
Wow, let me just say that there are millions of little things in those two jewelry making aisles. I picked up what I thought were rings that could be opened slip a bead through and clamp shut. I think they are called jump rings. Don't quote me on that. :) And I picked up big split ring key chains.
(On a side note, why is Micheal's the only place that does not have automated checks? I had to write out the whole thing. Which is a PITA when they only have one register open and there is a long line of crafty women behind you. Makes me feel guilty for not swiping my personal debit card.)
I get home. Start making dinner. Kids come home and all hell breaks loose. I have a 3rd grader and a 6th grader. 3:30pm is like a mad house.I get homework signed, lunch boxes emptied and snack in the kids, I sit down to see how the beads will work tonight.
I have that pre-crafting high. When you see in your mind how it will turn out and the crafting angels are singing a choir of praise and you think, this is going to be pinterest worthy.
I set everything out and realize, I bought the wrong thing! I wanted the jump rings and what I got was mini split rings! Oh no! There is no way these beads were going to work with mini split rings.
Time to run to Walmart.
Fast forward to meeting time! Surprisingly everything went well. We practiced the Promise in sign language, and then we started to work on our plaques. The girls are super creative. Some just used the colors to make patterns and others made shapes, like hearts. I love seeing what they come up with. Then we worked on the beads and key chains. They were seeing the end product for the first time.
Given how the day started, I was so pleased with the result.
Next up, Saturday we are going on a hike to a local state park with waterfalls to earn our Hiker's badge.
No comments:
Post a Comment