Lake Forest-Lake Bluff Girl Scouts Earn Highest Honor

Jessi Puryear of Lake Bluff and Jenna Nissly of Lake Forest, members of Girl Scout Troop 42698, recently earned Girl Scouts of the USA's most prestigious national honor for girls, the Girl Scout Gold Award.  They were among more than 80 local high school students honored by Girl Scouts of Greater Chicago and Northwest Indiana during a special ceremony on June 7, 2014, at the Hilton Rosemont Hotel.

Jenna Nissly's project Pillows for Pink provided small pillows for breast cancer patients.  She developed a website pillowsforpink.weebly.com with patterns, step-by-step directions and costs to make the pillows, which are used to cushion sensitive areas from seatbelts, as well as providing support between the arm and the body post-surgery and over ports.  Over 250 pillows were donated to Stroger Hospital and the Cancer Wellness Center.  They were also given out at the Stroger Hospital Breast Cancer Fair.  Sewing groups, Girl Scout troops and individuals continue to make and donate pillows to local hospital oncology departments as well as Stroger Hospital.  Advisors: Janet Hart and Terry Ann Nissly

Jessi Puryear's  The Preemie Project addressed one of the stressors affecting parent child bonding for families of premature babies, namely the difficulty for parents to care for their families, work and establish a bond with their premature infant.   The number of premature babies is increasing because medical science is improving so smaller, younger babies have more chance of survival.  This can also mean that they need to stay in infant care units longer, sometimes for several months.  The Preemie Project allowed parents to record stories, rhymes, and lullabies onto cassettes which were placed next to the babies isolette allowing the baby to hear their parents voices when they could not be there.  This allowed the baby to continue to bond with their parent in their absence and reduced parental stress by allowing them to care for other children, work, etc.  A garage sale was held to raise funds for the cassettes, recorders and batteries.  Children's books were donated to establish a reading library at Evanston Hospital for parents to read from when making cassette recordings.  Advisors: Tina Edwardson, Evanston Hospital and Terry Ann Nissly