Girl Scout Daisy books worth the money?

[FLAngie]

I will be a leader of a Girl Scout Daisy troop this fall. I have been looking at all the books and they definitely add up money wise. Can anyone recommend which are absolute necessities? I do have a lot of web sites bookmarked for activity ideas. I have also checked at the local library. They have the Daisy Guide, but none of the leader or journey books. So what do I have to get and what can I get by without

I was also wondering if other Daisy troops are doing both petals and the journeys or just one or the other.

Does anyone know where I could find the books cheaper? I have looked at the council website and at Amazon. They are priced the same. I am a little leery of ebay and my craigslist has nothing listed.

 

[xiola]

Buy them used from Amazon. I've bought tons of books from the marketplace there. I just glanced and saw that some of the Daisy books are .95 plus 3.99 shipping.

Another place to look is the various swapping sites like paperback swap. I looked there, and they have leader guides posted, but none of the others. With paperback swap, you can post books and receive credits or you can buy credits for 3.94 from the kiosk. Lots of times members will sell them for less than that in the book bazaar forum.

When I was a leader, up until juniors, I didn't find it necessary for each girl to have their own book.

 

[ceecee]

I had my Daisy's pay a small fee for dues and I bought the book (one for the troop) with that. Check with your council and they may have a leader willing to donate their old one. I donated my Daisy and Brownie books to a new leader. I also bought my Junior book on Ebay! If you ask for $10.00 per girl, that is a small amount but will give you $ for the book (which in my opinion is very helpful) and some craft supplies because at that age they love crafts. We just did the petals and it took most of the year to do those. Journeys are a new thing. By next year your account will have $ from product sales so be sure to factor that in when planning your "cookie reward" especially if the troop is buying the badges and books.

 

[Disneylush]

Do you have a 1/2 price books by you?
Otherwise list it on CL under wanted items. I read the wanted ads all day long and get rid of stuff I have and others want.

 

[Lets go to disney]

I got all of my daisy books donated but you can get by withoutthem. THe only book you need now is the journeys. My daisys did the petals this year and will do the journey next yer. Since the daisy programis now 2 years it works perfect. The other thing to remember is you can not buy the petals individully you have to buy them as a set so factor that money in if you are buying the girls their patches. oterwise that is a huge cost. Hope this helps. Any other questions please ask. I have a brownie and daisy troop and am the nbhd cookie chair and TO.

 

[MichelleinMaine]

Definately check with your council to see if another leader has old ones. That's where I got mine (free) and I similarly passed them along when done. The girls most assuredly do not need the individual books (they can't read anyway!

You're not going to find Journeys too many places discounted because it's the brand new program. Honestly, I am not even worrying about it. (I'm a 2nd year Brownie leader. We'll finish the old program and then move onto the new with Juniors.

FWIW, my friend-leading-Daisies took one look at their Journeys book and called me to ask what I thought GSA was smoking when they wrote it.
I'd just stick to petals. As someone else said, you buy the whole 11 petals as a set, so, even if they should stop selling them (I've heard rumors it's year after next...), you already have them. Plenty of non-petal activities you can do also, field trips, nature hikes and the like.

Have fun!

 

[FLAngie]

Thanks everyone for all the replies. I have sent out emails to everyone I can think of in the council that might have books to lend or donate.

This year I have a mixed troop (one daisy and 8 brownies). I have a conversion chart of brownie try-its to daisy petals so that we were able to do the try-its and the daisy was able to earn all of her petals during the year. This coming fall I will have only daisy's kindergarten and 1st grade. I know there will be 4 or 5 1st graders and I don't know how many kindergarten. I don't know which petals the rest of the 1st graders have earned yet either. I looked through the journey book and wasn't sure if the activities would hold their interest, but didn't know how much time I want to spend on petals if most of the girls have all of them already Can you tell I am confused!

Regardless, I am sure we will have lots of fun. My problem is that I am such a planner that I want to have everything planned out now and I wasn't sure how much I was missing without the books. I know that I used the brownie books a lot this year.

 

[Iott Family]

With the girl scout season/year coming to an end many leaders give away or sell cheap their old books. As their girls bridge up levels they pass on the books. You will want to "purchase" 1 each of the badge book, new journeys book and leaders guide and your council should have given you a copy of safety-wise.

You can make copies to pass out to the girls as you do each "activity" so they can follow along. This is what we do for our cadettes.

As for the badges/petals. Those purchases should come from troop funds depending on how well your product/cookie sells went OR you can request an upfront start-up fee from the parents of like $10 per girl to help off set the cost until your earnings from sales come thru.

 

[Ohiodislover]

My daughter is now a Jr. Our troop has always bought 2-3 books, and shared. Try Ebay, or half.com. We have found great deals on them.

 

[minniebeth]

I sent you a PM...

 

[FLAngie]

I just wanted to send out a GIANT THANK YOU to minniebeth for helping me out with the Daisy Guide book and some extras.