Clara, in Dorrington Brownies was presented with a very special award after raising over £10,000 to support Hope House Hospice. After losing a close friend, Clara decided she wanted to help and has been a avid fundraiser ever since, and more is planned. Pictured here with her unit…. well done Clara!
19th Shrewsbury Brownies had a fun evening at Bronwens Art Studio. The girls tried a range of activities and crafts but slime was definitely their favourite messy activity!
2nd Ellesmere Brownies held a royal wedding reception to celebrate Megan Markle and Prince Harry’s wedding. All
The Brownies became princesses and we toasted the happy couple, completing our wedding challenge badge.
Girlguiding Shropshire have been working over the past 12 months with Macmillan to fundraise and raise awareness. Girls, leaders and Trefoil Guild have been actively involved in many projects, raft races, cake sales, marathon marshalling and dressing up and dancing. They have raised £5,949 and supported events that have raised over £50,000 for the charity. It was great fun and the girls and young women have also enjoyed the community action project. Well done!
Holiday Brownies met for a day of Festive fun at Attingham park just before Christmas. The girls had a busy day completing their toymaker badge and also managed a reindeer treasure hunt around the mansion and a walk to see the deer being fed!
Holiday Brownies is for the girls on waiting lists for Brownies and they come along and make their promise and get up to all the same things as girls do in their weekly meetings. We meet at Easter, Summer and Christmas and if you would like anymore information contact Sue Deighton.
The members of 2nd Ellesmere Brownies have been collecting donations for their local food bank. The girls have been collecting items for the local food bank in their community as part of their community action, and collected together enough items to fill 35 shoeboxes!
2nd Ellesmere Brownies gathered together 35 shoe boxes full of kindness and love at Christmas.
Each box contained 5 meals and Christmas treats for Oswestry and Borders food bank. One Brownie quotes: “It feels really good though help other people!” ‘
Brownie leader Spark added: “We upheld our Promise. Brownies take action and expressed themselves.”
More than 60 Rainbows from across Telford South Division attended a special Breakfast with Santa event at the Park House Hotel on 2nd December. The girls were invited to have breakfast with their very special guest and were also given the chance to meet Santa as well as taking part in a sing-along. A great time was had by all and special thanks to the staff at the hotel who were happy to get into the spirit of things too by dressing up for the event.
Girlguiding Shropshire is pleased to be partnering with Macmillan Cancer Support on a number of events and challenges this year. To find out more about the partnership at region level and how you can get involved with some of the challenges, check out this web page.
Back in September, some of our leaders dressed up as pirates and took to the seas (well, the River Severn) as part of the Shrewsbury River Festival. The team was given supplies to build themselves a raft, putting their pioneering skills to the test and then all of the rafts got to take part in a race along the river. Not only did all of the Girlguiding Shropshire team’s knots stay in tact, but they paddled their way to victory as well, beating the other teams to win the race.
Also at the event, some of our volunteers spent a successful day teaming up with Macmillan Cancer Support to run a fundraising stall with a tombola and gifts for sale.
Here is our County Commissioner being awarded with the trophy for the winning raft at the event.
One of our leaders, Rebecca Harding, tells us about the challenge she set herself in the name of Girlguiding.
“In December 2016 I decided to challenge myself and signed up to take part in the Girlguiding UK Charity Trek of the Great Wall of China. As a Brownie leader I challenge Brownies each week to try new things and at 6th Whitchurch Brownies we are not allowed to say we can’t do something! So this was a challenge for me and throughout the challenge I was not allowed to say ‘I can’t do it’ – our Charity Trek group t-shirts said it all – ‘Girls can do anything’.
I first saw the challenge on the Girlguiding website, the iconic image of the Great Wall stood out and made me think I would love to go; traveling independently I knew going with Girlguiding I would be looked after and have fun. I signed up and told my family over Christmas dinner that I was going to China in 2017. I have been fundraising and training for the challenge throughout 2017 finding beautiful walks around Shropshire, Cheshire and North Wales borders as well as climbing lots of steps. The Girlguiding Charity Challenge co-coordinator at HQ has been very supportive and she also completed the challenge with us.
Over ten days at the end of September thirty ladies took part in the challenge, the majority of whom are members of Girlguiding but the charity challenges are open to anyone to raise money for Girlguiding UK. Some of the group flew out to China the week before the trek and had an extension trip to see the Terracotta Warriors; I joined the second group traveling to China for the trek. The trek was organised by Discover Adventures and we were joined by two guides from Discover Adventure, a doctor and two local Chinese guides. We spent 6 days walking along different sections of the Great Wall of China – this included walking on parts of the original wall, wall that had been restored, walking on / by un-restored wall. The weather was kind to us and we had breathtaking views of China. The walks were challenging with lots of steps and slopes to climb up and down. Each night we stayed in different hotels close to the section of wall we would be climbing the next day.
All of the ladies successfully completed the challenge and have raised £45,000 at present for Girlguiding UK – this money will be used for new unit grants, grants for units in deprived areas, training for Peer Educators, paying for members to travel and speak at high profile events to influence decision making and supporting members with disabilities.
I loved taking part in this challenge, I challenged myself physically, experienced a wide variety of Chinese culture and met amazing inspirational ladies as we supported each other to meet our personal goals.”