Our first Balcony Girls!

A couple years ago I read about a concept called Balcony Girls from a blog I really like called the Reluctant Entertainer. Basically Balcony Girls is a group of young pre-teen or teen age girls and the idea is that they learn to build one another up, not tear others down.





When I read all of the blog posts about Balcony Girls I knew in my heart it was something I would like to do with my daughters and their friends. I remember very well from when I was younger that these are tough years for girls. And unfortunately girls can really be downright mean to one another. Now I'm not saying that my daughter and her friends were treating each other badly, but just that it's so important to teach girls the right way to be a friend.





I loved the idea of creating a group of girls and helping them see their friendships with each other as a strong bond that could withstand the tough times. I wanted them to grow in their relationships with the Lord as well as with each other. I want each of them to be a shining light for Christ in their schools.



I decided that I would do this group with my older daughter and a bunch of her friends this year, and maybe in a couple years do it again with my younger daughter and her friends. In our current group we have 2 homeschoolers and the rest attend public school. It's so cool to see the differences in each of these girls, the things they enjoy, the things they are passionate about, the different personalities - all brought together to create an amazing group of girls!



So, let's get right in to what we did.

The first lesson was about CARING.

Lesson goal: To become a caring girl and to understand the importance of building one another up, and not tearing each other down with our words and actions.

I had each of the girls introduce themselves and then stand up front and share something that they are into - such as swimming or singing or basketball or something like that. After each girl spoke the rest of us all cheered and clapped loudly so we could all feel how good it feels to have people encourage us and cheer us on.

Then we had some discussion time about how we have each experienced being put down or bullied at one time or another. We talked about how those situations made us feel and how we might handle them in the future. We also talked about times when we have been encouraged or built up by others and how that made us feel. It was a really neat conversation and I was pleasantly surprised at how open the girls were and that they really shared their hearts.

Then we took a break for pizza for dinner ...

As they sat around the table they decided to play the telephone game - it was so cute to watch them giggle and laugh and have so much fun with their girlfriends!

After pizza we went back to the living room for the rest of our lesson time. I remember as a young teen doing an exercise where we had a piece of paper taped on our back and every one had to go around and write one nice thing on your back. So I decided this would be the perfect activity to do as part of this lesson. Some of the girls barely knew each other but I encouraged them to still find at least one nice thing to say about each and every other girl in the room. It took a few minutes for them to go to each and every girl ...

Then we sat back down and everyone got to read all the nice things that were said about them. I LOVED the comments -- some were compliments on their looks like beautiful hair or pretty eyes - but many were about their character such as brave, kind, caring, sweet, happy, etc ... I encouraged the girls to tuck these papers away in a special place to remind themselves that they are special and wonderful girls and that they have a great group of girlfriends who think the world of them.

Next for a craft we painted canvases. I asked them to paint Balcony Girls on their canvas and then paint either words or pictures that would represent what we're all about - kindness, love, truth, etc. They spent a good amount of time on these and it was neat to see all the different ways they created their canvas. They took them home so they could frame them as a reminder of what it means to be a Balcony Girl.

Here is one of the paintings ...

At the end the girls went home with a folder to keep any Balcony Girls papers in. We talked about upcoming dates {I'm hoping to do this once per month.} And we reviewed our key verse which is 'Make the most of every opportunity. Be gracious in your speech. The goal is to bring out the best in others in a conversation, not put them down, not cut them out.' Colossians 4:4

All in all I think it was a great time for all the girls! I am really looking forward to our next get together!

If you'd like to learn more about Balcony Girls, check out Sandy's blog The Reluctant Entertainer. She provides an e-book for purchase which gives all the lesson plans for 8 Balcony Girls lessons. I bought the e-book and printed it all out so I would have it to use each month. I believe she is just about getting ready to release a second e-book with even more lessons too. So if you think this is something you'd like to do with a group of young girls you know go check it out!