Girl Scout Cookie Time

Yep! It is that time of year again! You can almost feel the sugar rush and calories flowing into your body, huh? Above is my favorite - the Samoa - ahhh... is there a better cookie? Next is Tim's favorite. I have to be desperate for chocolate to eat a thin mint. I secretly think that is why they are his favorite - because they actually stick around because I don't really like them. Last is the Cafe Cookie. I think this was new last year and I never got around to trying it. I was reading the description and it sounds like it could quite possible taste like those cookies you sometimes get on an airplane. Yes, I am odd, I really like those airline cookies. They are sweet and caramelized. I am going to try some of the Cafe ones this year. Savannah has her cookie list below. In the bottom right corner it has a place where she is supposed to put her goal. Can you see that she wrote in 1800 boxes of cookies! Oh my! Do I have an overachiever or what? I had to rain on her parade and tell her that wasn't even in the realm of possibilities. She took it as well as could be expected! Seriously, I was considering scaling back our cookies sales this year. Last year we sold somewhere around 235 boxes. There is a really good reason behind this - I found that Sebastian loved walking around the neighborhood. He was particularly crabby at this time last year and it was a fluke. I had taken them out to sell to our immediate neighbors. He was so happy, we kept walking and then we did it again the next day. We sold a ton of cookies! He was happy and ready to go to bed when we arrived home. See, I had a good reason to sell those cookies. It wasn't until afterward that I found out that there is a better reason for selling them. I was a girl scout for I think 7 years and always sold cookies. Savannah has been a girl scout for 4 years. This is her 3rd year selling cookies. I knew that the cookies made money for girl scouts, but I never really knew how much. Last year, our leader told us and I pulled up the info on the web this year. I found that your local area girl scouts get 70% of the cost of each box of cookies. Of that 70%, about 17% goes directly to our troop. Then I did the math... If Savannah sold 235 boxes last year, she made $822.50 total. Of that $822.50, $139.83 went directly to her troop and the balance of $682.67 went to support the girl scout council in our area. That means it paid for all the wonderful camps she has gotten to travel to or it covered office expenses or field trip expenses, etc. That is pretty amazing that by selling cookies, we were able to help contribute that much. And they are pretty easy to sell because everyone wants them. So, like I said, I was pondering whether we would try to sell very much this year. I have a lot on my plate right now with trying to move and stay sane all at the same time. My wonderful husband asked me not to take on a bunch of cookie sales because he knows I am a wee bit stressed. So far we have sold about 90 boxes by not doing a whole lot of work and I was wondering if I should walk the neighborhood a little more with her and sell some more cookies. I even thought that we most likely won't be here next year, so why should we sell? Then I remembered that she has been to camp 3 times and enjoyed every minute of it. I remembered that her wonderful leader has put many hours and lots of her own money into this troop. I guess it came down to that if walking around the neighborhood selling some cookies gives back to the camps and her troop, then it is something I think we should be doing. And as a bonus Sebastian will be so happy! When we walked up one side of the street on Sunday evening, he wanted to hug and kiss every person as we left! What a silly and loving boy! I only let him hug this one sweet older lady and I think it made her day. I would love for him to be able to share his sweetness, but I am so afraid he will get the flu!