Fourth of July Parade! :D

On July 3, 2012 my project "officially" started!
It was the day before the Fourth of July !

Every year, there is a parade in my community that includes all sorts of organizations and people-Veterans march, recreational baseball and other sports teams march, the boy scouts and Girl Scouts march, the Fire Department marches and rides on the Firetruck, etc.

Tons and tons of people come to watch the parade each year-they line up on either side of the street for blocks and blocks.

Even though I had only been approved to start my project a week before, I knew I had to participate in the parade. It was the perfect opportunity to encourage younger girls in the community to join girl scouting!

So, I went to work right away! I spent an hour at a local party store purchasing red, white and blue star necklaces to hand out at the parade. I used the money that I had saved up recycling used bottles and cans at the supermarket (this is an AWESOME way to save Gold Award $$, by the way!). I also had the Girl Scout Tax Deductible form, which exempts any items bought for my Gold project from being taxed-I just had to pay the ticketed price and nothing more.

I then printed out a hundred little strips of paper to staple around the necklaces. They each said: "

Girl Scouts builds girls of courage, confidence and character. Join today!

Girl Scouts of Nassau County                  www.gsnc.org                          516-741-2550

The parade was so much fun! I met up with a several troops of younger girls. We marched with their banners and flags and handed out all of the necklaces that I made. It was a tough job at first, though-all of the necklaces ended up getting tangled! If anyone else uses this idea-DO NOT let fifty necklaces get tangled during the actual parade!

Luckily, there were a bunch of TOTALLY AWESOME leaders and GSA officials walking with me to help me untangle all of them! There was a lot of laughter and fun as we untangled and handed out necklaces to little girls watching the parade! :D

I even heard a couple of girls say that they would be joining Girl Scouts next year!

All in all, the necklace project was a HUGE success! Next time, I will have to make even MORE, though (We ran out of necklaces half way through the parade)! But I will have to devise a better way of carrying them around so that they will not get hopelessly tangled. :)

A Special Thanks to all of the Leaders and Girl Scouts who helped me out during the Fourth of July Parade! You all did a great job! :D