Girl Guides

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Hi, I'm Frances and I am part of the Lettings team.

I’ve been involved in Girlguiding since the age of 7 and wherever I go and whoever I have worked with, they all know how passionate I am about it.

From an onlookers perspective, I give up a couple of hours a week during term time have a bit of fun with a group of girls aged 11 - 14 and give out a few badges. Boy do we do more than that.

As a leader, we have to attend trainings to ensure we are providing the best balanced programme that we can. We plan evenings, deal with admin, complete the accounts, we drop things off when the forgetful Guide leaves her winter coat at the meeting place and it has just started snowing, all for the price of a smile. So when Sainsbury’s launched their active kids vouchers last Spring, I shouted form the rooftops that we needed vouchers so that I could build up our very lacking resources.

My colleagues at James Sellicks came to the rescue immediately, showering me with vouchers at regular intervals. Along with the vouchers from my colleagues, I stole vouchers from friends and family and the parents willing donated. As a result, our unit managed to collect so many vouchers that we were able to order a set of tennis balls, 2 packs of blindfolds for doing activities to increase disability awareness and a parachute, which is great for playing games with.

Being a volunteer means that we do all this out of the goodness of our hearts, but it is all worthwhile when we see that one girl smile and beam with pride when she finally achieves that thing she has been working so hard towards, or the parent with the shy girl, who barely speaks, tells us that when she came home from camp she would not stop talking about all the fun she had and all the new friends she has made.

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