National
Girl Scout Cookie Weekend is a time for cookie lovers everywhere to learn more
about the good the Girl Scouts do for their local community. This year,
we’re happy to share just a few of those exceptional stories with you.
Through
the cookie program, our Girl Scouts are given an incredible opportunity to make
a difference in lives of others and in their surrounding
community. A fabulous example is Emily, a 7-year old
Brownie on a mission to honor her late father.
Emily’s
father, Ethan, had previously battled cancer in his teenage years, but was in
remission when he met Emily’s mother, Suzanne, in 2006. After his cancer
had tragically spread throughout his body, he passed away in 2009 at age 24,
just one year after Emily was born. While fighting cancer, he was treated
at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC, and that’s where Emily decided to
pay it forward.
Through
the Gift of Caring option at Girl Scouts of Western Pennsylvania, Emily is able
to give cookie customers the option to donate cookies to the children’s
hospital. Last season, Emily easily surpassed her
original donation goal of 1,000 boxes, and worked with her troop to
donate a whopping 4,000 boxes to the children. “Her family told me they’d
love nothing more than to see every children’s hospital across the country
receive a cookie donation like this,” said Nancy Irwin, communications director
for Western Pennsylvania.
Though
Emily did not have much of a chance to know her father, it seems that she
embodies a lot of qualities he possessed. When asked by a local paper why Emily wanted to do this, her mother had a
simple answer. “She’s just a very good-hearted kid who wants to do good,”
Suzanne said. “She’s him.”
So,
when you head out to a cookie booth in your community this weekend, be sure to
ask the girls what they do with their cookie money. Because, oh, what a
girl can do!