{Girl Scout Week} Colorful Girl Scout Investiture Ceremony!

Hey party peeps!
Last week was the 101th Birthday of The Girl Scouts and I’d like to celebrate all this week by sharing some of the parties I threw for my own troops as well as for 100+ Girl Scouts in the Central Coast of California region….beginning with this COLORFUL GIRL SCOUT INVESTITURE CEREMONY! An investiture ceremony is a Girl Scout tradition where girls officially become Girl Scouts.

Okay…okay…this week may be a bit sentimental for me! As a former Girl Scout Troop Leader to 2 troops…I know…I know…it was CHAOTIC… yet one of the most REWARDING times of my life! It all began with my youngest daughter Faith asking to be a Girl Scout.  She was in first grade…WOW…Time flies!!!  Anyway, we attended the informational meeting and was shocked when the GS representative looked around the room and asked if any of us parents wanted to step up and volunteer to be troop leader!  WHAT???  I  Being the control freak that I am, I volunteered! I already had an inventory of party supplies and experience with throwing kids’ parties…so how hard could this be….Right? Well, I quickly learned that it is NOT easy and I salute all my fellow Girl Scout troop leaders out there who are giving of their time and energy to their troops! HIGH-FIVE!

The Investiture Ceremony was my first event I hosted for my Daisy Troop. How cute are they? As a newbie GS leader, I didn’t know what I was doing, BUT I KNEW HOW TO THROW A PARTY! The girls and their parents had a blast! We totally took over the classroom at our local Discovery Museum for our ceremony and then had a blast exploring the museum.

THE DECOR PLAN
I wanted to create a whimsical, playful and colorful atmosphere for the girl’s special night so I used bright and bold colors. The museum’s party room has this HUGE cloth pin board running along one wall which is the perfect canvas to hang pretty much anything. To give the room a whimsical feel, I pinned round foam placemats and drink coasters on the wall in a playful pattern.  The room already had these polka dot curtains hanging in there and the primary colored kids’ chairs so I just included them in the decor plan!  Since there was so much color going on, I dressed all the tables with a solid color table linen to unify the tables and allow the colors to pop!

GIRLFRIEND TIP: When designing a party on a budget…and believe me…this was on a BUDGET!  Look first at what you have before committing to a decor plan.  For me, I had a lot of multi-colored items in my inventory so I didn’t have to buy a lot of new items.  Get creative in how you use items too!  The runners were made by stretching out Christmas ornament garlands!

THE FAVORS
I am a HUGE fan of displaying your favors on a table to give you an extra chance to add some fabulous decor to your room.  Here the Favor Bar was the focal point of the room as it was used in the ceremony.  Each girl was given a colorful mini ornament at their seats.  As they came up to the table, they hung their ornament on the plain wire tree, recited the Girl Scout Promise and was given their favor bag full of Girl Scout goodies.  The purpose of the ornament hanging was that the tree was bare and plain all alone…just like our troop was when it had no members, but when each girl added their unique and colorful personality to the tree, it became FABULOUS!  Symbolizing that the girls together made the tree gorgeous and unique just like our troop is now full of girls with their own unique personalities.

THE ACTIVITIES
No Girl Scout party would be complete without Girl Scout Cookies!  This photo was taken before the cookies were displayed.  The backdrop was a board that our troop would use at each meeting displaying the Girl Scout Promise and the Daisy Petals that they would earn throughout the year.  The Discovery Museum was full of fun activities for the girls to do where they could use their imaginations and explore including a pretend Animal Store, Farm with full-size tractor and rock wall!  

Thanks for taking this trip down memory lane with me! I’ll be sharing more of my Girl Scout parties all week on the blog! Even in you aren’t a Girl Scout leader, you can find some party inspiration and activity ideas here that you can use when planning your child’s next birthday party.
Cheers!
Tonya