Month: June 2025

Self-Expression Through Camp Crafts

Written by Council Historian, Christine Cline

Have you ever noticed that no matter how long you are at camp, there seems to be a craft involved during the time you are there? Well, I did, and it is something that has been going on for as long as I can remember. I decided to put some thought into the reasons for that, and to discuss crafts that were popular fifty years ago when I was a kid at camp.

The first reason crafts are popular at camp is simple: they help pass the time. Crafts are also a great go-to when it is raining, or if the weather gets too hot, or if the campers need some down time.

While I’d love to say that all crafts can be done outdoors, the wind doesn’t always cooperate. Still, many activities can be done outside. Some camps are lucky enough to have a dedicated craft cabin stocked with supplies, which allows for an even wider variety of creative experiences.

So why crafts in the first place? Because we learn so much from them. You might be surprised by how much a simple project can teach you.

Crafts help build:

  • The ability to follow step-by-step directions
  • Dexterity and fine motor skills
  • Patience, especially when you need to redo a step
  • Empathy and leadership by helping others with their projects
  • Self-confidence when you complete something challenging
  • The understanding that you don’t have to be good at everything
  • The courage to try new things
  • Responsibility for cleaning up after yourself
  • A sense of design and color coordination
  • Practical skills by making something useful
  • Camaraderie through shared creative time

Crafts can also reinforce lessons being taught in other areas, and sometimes they can even be life changing.

Craft time is also the best time to talk to friends, make new friends, and just really enjoy yourself.

Crafts will always be a part of camp. Some crafts are still being done today that have been done from many years ago, but many have changed. I decided to look up some old-time craft projects from fifty years ago, and to put them out there for the modern generation.

I thought long and hard about what crafts I remember doing as a child at camp, and asked others which ones they remembered too.

The crafts from my youth were usually simple, because there were few craft items available at the time. Most craft items that were available were made of glue, scissors, glitter, colored paper, and such from the local store. So, the crafts I have chosen are very similar to the ones I did fifty years ago. Take take a look below to see examples of the crafts from my past.

Tissue Paper Flowers

Items Needed:

  • Tissue paper in any color you wish
  • Green pipe cleaner for the stem
  • Scissors

Instructions:

  1. Cut at least six pieces of tissue paper into 4×4 sheets. This makes the simplest flowers.
  2. Fold back and forth.
  3. Fold in half.
  4. At the fold, hook pipe cleaner around center.
  5. Carefully open tissue paper one at a time.

For fancier flowers you can cut tissue into a circle, use fancy scissors to cut the outer edges of the circle, or even cut divots out. This project can be done with recycled tissue paper from gift bags. This project is for ages eight and up. I loved to make these flowers. They are a great craft for Mother’s Day, and if you look online, you can see that they can get quite elaborate.  You can learn to make very creative wall designs with them.

Weaving Paper

Items Needed:

  • Paper
  • Scissors or paper cutter
  • Glue or tape

Choose paper that is a bit thicker and smoother for this project.  Back in the day, we only had thin paper, and it made it more difficult to weave the paper without tearing it.  This project is limited by your imagination. I was amazed when I saw just how creative people were getting with their designs. I noticed some type of paper grabber in the center of the third photograph. This is a very complex and beautiful project, and a definite progression from the above two photos.

Toilet Paper Roll Puppets

Items Needed:

  • Toilet paper rolls
  • Colored paper
  • Googly eyes
  • Feathers
  • Glue
  • Anything else you can think of

There used to be a lot of toilet paper rolls at camp until someone invented enormous rolls.  but at my house we still seem to go through a lot of the stuff and can accumulate plenty of toilet paper rolls for a group to do a project quickly.  This project is limited only by your imagination.  I have a few photos to get you started. I remember doing this with my mom to make Christmas ornaments. The ideas online are so varied, in scope and variety. There are even ideas for making home decoration projects. The pink ones are cell phone holder. I love the variety of ideas shown above, and the stamp for the flower.  Many more can be found online.

Yarn Art

Items Needed:

  • Scraps of yarn
  • Cardboard, could be from cereal boxes or cardboard boxes.
  • Glue, HIGHLY recommend craft glue. But use what you have. 
  • Also, HIGHLY recommend not gluing on the shiny side of any surface.

Picture shown is a guide. Use your imagination. The shown picture is between 4×4 to 6×6 inches large. You do not want to make the pictures too large when you have a finite time for craft class. Start by drawing your idea on a piece of paper. Have fun!

This project is a great way to use up scraps of yarn. Cut the yarn pieces a little longer than needed, then cut the ends after you have glued them on to get a neat, clean edge. Older kids could use a utility knife.

Popsicle Stick Catapult

Items Needed:

  • Eight popsicle sticks or the larger tongue depressor type ones.
  • Three thicker rubber bands.
  • One sturdy plastic spoon
  • Cotton balls, aluminum, or pompoms

Instructions:

  1. Stack seven of the popsicle sticks on top of each other and then put a rubber band around one end until it is tight.
  2. Slip the last stick between the first and second stick in the stack and move it to the center of the stack, then wrap the second rubber band around the end of the stack tightly.(Some people will use another popsicle stick instead of a spoon and glue a bottle cap to it as the launch mechanism.  Plastic spoons do tend to break.  But so do popsicle sticks, which is why some people moved to the larger tongue depressors.)
  3. Secure the plastic spoon to one end of the single popsicle stick with the last rubber band until tight.

Use cotton balls, or other small light balls made of aluminum foil or other items such as pompoms to launch from your catapult.

Set up targets or buckets and make a game of it!

String Art

Items Needed:

  • A piece of wood, or a piece of cardboard
  • String in the colors you have chosen
  • Nails
  • Hammer
  • Template

This project can be very easy to very complicated. The first thing you need to do is to figure out which project you want to do, then get the correct supplies for it.  The easier projects do not need a hammer and nails, and can be done with just cardboard. I remember enjoying this project as a child. Here are several examples of different types of projects.

Bead Doll

Items Needed:

  • Pony beads
  • Any other beads you have
  • Larger wooden bead for head
  • Pipe cleaner to hold beads
  • Yarn
  • Markers

Assemble beads onto the pipe cleaners, one for each side of the body.Get creative and have fun! Name your creations. Great for using up beads. Use this photo as a starting point.

We have made so many things out of beads, but I thought these dolls were so cute and could be used to play with while at camp. Like a camp buddy. It would be something I could see myself keeping for a long time.

Line Art

Items Needed:

  • Paper, white or light colored
  • Crayons, colored pencils, markers, or chalk.
  • Your imagination

This is a project that starts out slow and grows with you. As a child we only did the easy thing.  Just lines around our name, or from corner to corner on a piece of paper.  Now, it has grown to be much more creative and beautiful.  This project is for all ages. You can see the progression from the first line drawing to the second one.  There are many more examples online.

I hope you enjoy them, and I hope you enjoyed this brief history of crafts.

Happy Camping All!

-Christine

Embracing Possibilities and Changing the World: 2025 Gold Award Girl Scouts

This year’s Gold Award Girl Scouts are change-makers, role models, and real-life heroes. To earn the Gold Award, Girl Scouts must invest more than 80 hours of leadership, project management, and service to create a sustainable impact in their communities and beyond.

Girl Scouts of Greater Chicago and Northwest Indiana is proud to recognize the 38 Girl Scouts who earned their Gold Award.

We invite you to celebrate their accomplishments and explore the incredible possibilities they’ve embraced to make our world a better place.

Tribute to Achievement: Embrace Possibilities

On April 2, 2025, we celebrated our Tribute to Achievement Dinner at the Four Seasons Hotel Chicago. This year’s Tribute to Achievement Dinner highlighted the Girl Scout Mission in action by recognizing our awardees who have made the world a better place by advancing opportunities for girls and women. 

We were delighted to have recognized three exceptional honorees who advocate for the empowerment of girls and women each day: Laura Ricketts, Executive Chairperson, Chicago Stars and Board Chair, Cubs Charities (Luminary Award); BMO (Corporate Award), accepted by Jen Guidi; and Sue Major, CEO, Major Executive Search (Girl Scout’s Own Award).

Watch the Embrace Possibilities Video

Thanks to your generosity, we raised more than $885,000 to provide life-changing experiences for girls and help them Embrace all the Possibilities. 

A special thank you to our 2025 Tribute to Achievement Sponsors!  

 

Girl Scouts tour the Pullman Community

Our Girl Scouts, friends, and family participated in a tour through the historic Pullman District. This was just one of the many activities scheduled for our Social Inclusion Week.

Tour Guide and Chicago Historian Dilla of Mahogany Tours explained that Pullman was one of the first industrialized communities in the United States, featuring a campus that included a manufacturing plant for Pullman train cars and housing for its workers.  

Before the rise of the aircraft industry, rail was the preferred and primary mode of cross-country transportation.  Pullman Cars, also known as sleeping cars, offered far more comfort than sitting in a regular seat, much like today’s airplane sleep pods. Manufacturing of Pullman Cars ceased in 1982.

Although the Girl Scouts explored the area by bus, there are several exhibits visitors can access in a 5-block radius, including the Administration Clock Tower building and the Pullman Exhibit Hall. The National A. Phillip Randolph Pullman Porter Museum is currently closed and under construction. Walking throughout the community, one can also notice the architectural differences between the homes of the “bosses” and the general workers (who, by the way, all came to work dressed in suits).

Two interesting moments stood out on the tour. One of the Girl Scouts asked how individuals with walking disabilities would have navigated the streets and multi-level family homes in the past. Dilla explained, gently but honestly, that unless a family member was willing or able to carry them up and down the stairs, those individuals were often confined to one floor or sent away to live in places that were not very pleasant. Today, many homeowners have installed elevators (typically at the back of the building) and, thanks to the Americans with Disabilities Act, the streets are more accessible.

Dilla also shared the story of A. Phillip Randolph, who in 1925 organized the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (later known as Pullman Porters), the first successful African American-led labor union. The Porters also played a key role in the Great Migration by distributing the Chicago Defender and other black-owned newspapers along their routes. It was also commonly known that if someone needed to leave town quickly, and they knew a porter, they could sometimes be smuggled onto the train and safely dropped off at a stop along the way. 

Kathy, the daughter of a Pullman Porter, shared a special memory. While traveling back to Southern Illinois University (Carbondale) and boarding The Illini at the Homewood station (yes, trains back then had names), her father saw a fellow porter on the train. Because this train’s final destination was New Orleans, it came equipped with a dining car and several sleeping cars.  As part of the Loyal Order of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, he told his colleague, “That’s my youngest daughter on her way back to school, so you watch out for her.” Needless to say, she didn’t sit in coach that day. The porter escorted her to the front of the train, where she sat in a comfortable roomette for the duration of the trip. An unforgettable experience, and one still on her bucket list to relive.

The tradition of tipping in the service industry also has roots in the history of the Pullman Porters. Because they weren’t paid much, porters relied heavily on tips for shining shoes, turning down beds, and providing exceptional service. Many celebrities traveled by rail at the time, and stories were often shared among porters. Her father used to say that while some big names in particular were very generous tippers, others were not.

It was an inspiring and educational day, and we’re proud to offer experiences like this that connect our Girl Scouts and their families to the powerful stories woven into Chicago’s history.

Special thanks to Kathy C. for sharing this story and her reflections with us.