What have I gotten myself into?

As a SAH mom, I consider it both my job and my privilege to be able to volunteer my time with Kiddo-related things. Thursday morning, I returned home from my first PTSA meeting at the new school, calendar bursting with dates of various things I'd volunteered to do or help with over the coming months. I had a voicemail from the woman who is the Girl Scouts coordinator for the school. You see, Kiddo really wanted to do Girl Scouts last year, but the Daisy troop for her kindergarten met much too late in the evening for her to be able to participate, so she couldn't do it. After we moved this summer, we inquired about Daisy troops at her new school and learned there was one (and it meets right after school!), so we signed Kiddo up.

Well. The woman was calling me to explain that there are too many girls for the existing troop and that there are enough girls to form a second troop for the first grade. The only thing is....

she didn't have any parent willing to step up and be the leader for this new troop. She had a few different moms who were willing to "help out" but no one who'd say "I will be the leader." Without a leader, there could be no new troop.

Now, I was in Girl Scouts for several years myself. I started as a Brownie (we didn't have Daisies back in the olden days when I was a kid) and made it up through Cadet before other extracurricular activities took up too much of my time and I gave up Scouting. (Never fear; I still was involved in my church youth group *and* the 4-H sheep club, so I retained my Nerd Credentials all the way through high school.) I loved Scouting, despite being horribly unpopular among my fellow troopmates (well, I was horribly unpopular in general, I just mean that it wasn't like the other girls in my troop and I were BFFs because we did Girl Scouts together). I liked earning badges and learning all the new things that went with them. I liked the camping each summer. I even liked selling the cookies (which were *way* cheaper back in those days, holy heck). I am pretty sure Kiddo would enjoy Girl Scouts, and she was really sad when the girls in her class last year would talk about their troop - it seemed at times that there was a clique (yes, a clique in kindergarten, ugh) made of the girls who were in the Daisy troop, and knowing that Kiddo was excluded and wanted to be included made me kinda sad. Kiddo would be at times wistful, upset or plain mad that there was fun stuff going on in the Daisies and she couldn't participate.

So, I did it. I said "Sure, I'll lead the new troop!" I've got an organizational meeting this morning and a training meeting Monday night. Kiddo is very excited that I'm going to be the Daisy Troop leader. I just need to be able to hand the troop over to someone else in a few years, when camping enters the picture............

Anyone out there a Daisy Scout Troop leader? If so, I'd welcome any resources or links you find useful that you could share! I've already picked my aunt's brain; she's been involved in Scouting for a long time and is quite high up in the leadership ranks for her region (sadly, she's down in NJ so about six hours away...) I've also asked the mom who is the leader of the current troop for any assistance she can lend me in getting this new troop up and running. Hopefully, it will be fun for the girls and for me!

Oh, and apparently the Daisies can sell cookies, so if you have a hankering for some delicious and not-at-all overpriced Girl Scout cookies later this fall, you know where to come for all your Thin Mint needs!