March 10, 2006

Good deeds done

Evergreen Brownie Troop 994 rolls up its collective sleeves to give back to others

By Diego Abeloos
Editor

For Brownie Troop 994, doing good deeds is a necessity.

Brownie troop 994 members Athena Westmoreland and Jamie Beecher collect coats for the One Warm Coat program. The troop collected 15 large black garbage bags for the event, filling Joan Beecher’s Ford Expedition.

That’s because the troop, which is sponsored by Evergreen’s Grace Lutheran Church, has been learning in a practical and applicable sense the gift of giving through Joan Beecher, a volunteer whose granddaughter Jamie is a part of the seven-girl group.

“Part of the reason why I do it is because I want my granddaughter to be in a close-knit organization and to grow up with friends that were doing this kind of work,” Beecher said. “I’m sorry to say, but I don’t let them go out into the street and just play. I don’t do that.”

Beecher, a lifelong Lutheran, first acquired her sense of giving back when she was a young girl in the Rainbow Girls, a Masonic service organization. Now helping out with her granddaughter’s Brownie troop, she’s looking to pass the skills and desire for community service onto her Brownies.

“I would say that through the Rainbow Girls, besides church, is where I got the idea that you have to do service projects,” Beecher said. “My whole life has been that. …We’ve just always done it, now matter where I lived.”

Since Grace Lutheran Church began sponsoring the troop at the end of September, the Brownies have been quite busy making others happy.

First up was a collection event for Hope Services in October and November 2004, when the troop had to collect a minimum of three bags per person, filled with household items such as pots and pans, dishes, towels and bed sheets, to name just a few.

The event saw 24 large black garbage bags filled with items collected by the Brownies.

From the there, the Brownies jumped right into the Christmas spirit, bringing a toy and three cans of food each for the Toys for Tots program, holding the collection at Laurelwood School.

Beecher, who is in charge of the church’s social ministry committee, also came upon an idea for her Brownies following the holidays.

Beecher and her committee handcrafted dozens of Christmas cards, which were then distributed to two local nursing homes, Mission De La Casa and the Mt. Pleasant Nursing Home.

Members of Brownie troop 994 get busy making Valentine’s day cards, which were later distributed to the elderly at the Mission De La Casa home in Evergreen.

On the suggestion of a nursing home staffer after this past holiday season’s Christmas card handout event, Beecher took her card-making idea to her Brownie troop, and asked the group to make Valentine’s Day cards for the elderly at the homes. With the help of church members in the social ministry committee, the Brownies rolled up their sleeves and promptly produced approximately 300 Valentine’s Day cards, which were then distributed to everyone in the Mission De La Casa home.

“They would fall over each other practically, trying to hand someone a card,” Beecher said of her troop’s trip to the home.

The latest venture for troop 994 was through a program called One Warm Coat. In early February, the troop managed to collect warm coats, sweaters, windbreakers and other warm clothing items for a grand total of 15 large black garbage bags. The bags were then delivered to the San Jose Family Shelter. The haul was so big, Beecher’s Ford Expedition was stuffed to the brim with bags.

The troop, which consists of all third-grade 8-year-old girls from local schools, including Cadwallader, Evergreen, C.A. Clark, Matsumoto and Laurelwood elementary schools, meets twice a month at the church to plan and execute their community service projects. While it does seem like a lot of work to some, said Beecher, the girls still manage to have a lot fun and work together very well.

Beecher said she hopes to continue to have the troop participate in more service projects not only this year, but also when the group returns next year as Junior Girl Scouts.

“In doing these projects, they have fun making this,” Beecher said. “But, they have no fear, they love going and I think they’ll have this with them the rest of their lives, like I did.”