Cookies Are Coming

If you live in Central Illinois your Girl Scout Cookies are coming. For our, troop cookie delivery begins tomorrow. I am our troop Cookie Mom. What does that mean? It can be daunting if you troop is big, but this year I have a small troop. Basically I have to attend a Cookie Parent Training so I can learn what is required, how to order, how money is collected, when and who to turn money into, how booth sales will work, and what my responsibilities are etc. Next, I have to give girl training and a parent meeting to clarify their responsibilities. Then the girls take orders and I collect, tally and place the troop order. Then comes the hard part coordinating who will help pick up the cookies from warehouse and coordinating cookie booth sales. I need to have volunteers for that as my little car will not hold enough cookies. This year I have been lucky; there has been plenty of help.
Last night I made up the receipts for everyone- every year this process become easier. 5 years ago when I started volunteering with Girl Scouts I had to hand write all the receipts -my copies and the parent copies for the cookie pick up, money, and incentives. I also had to hand-write all the troop order forms and drive them to someone else then they had to copy it to the service unit order forms and submitted the order. The service unit contact had to hand-write all the troops order receipts too. Now I only double check the girls order form and I can enter the troop info directly into an order placement system online. It tallies the troop total and will even give me a list of what each girl owes, the number of each type of cookies, and the incentives. Of course this is much easier than before but it does not produce individual receipts for each girl/leader/parent with all the info in one place. But it does make it easier for me to make up my own on the computer and print them in multiples. That was what I was doing last night making up individual cookie receipts for each girl. They still give us the hand receipts to use- I use those for “oh my neighbor wants x# of cookies can you get them?” moments.
Tonight I will have to move some furniture and clean a little. I have to make space for all those cookies to come into my house, be sorted, and picked up by the other parents. Wish me luck.