To earn the Gold Award, a Girl Scout must complete seven steps that include 30 hours of leadership involvement, 40 hours of career exploration, achieve the Girl Scout 4Bs Challenge Award Charm and complete a significant service project. Both Shaw and McCabe began working on their Gold Awards nearly two years ago.

   Shaw created a coloring book for children that she calls, "Making Friends with the Dentist," a picture and storybook explaining what a child’s encounter with the dentist would be like. She says she had a bad experience with a dentist when she was a child and wanted to do something that would help other children to prepare for a positive visit to the dentist.

   Her book includes photos of the dentist’s tray of instruments and an encouraging explanation telling children that these are the tools the dentist uses to clean your teeth. Another page describes the dentist’s chair and that it moves up and down to help the dentist easily reach the patient. Each page features Shaw’s own photography. Xerox Corporation donated 250 copies of the book and Crayola donated over 200 boxes of crayons. Shaw placed copies of the coloring book in her pediatric dentist’s office and also in Caledonia Family Dentistry. She took her story to St. Agnes preschool in Avon and to story hours in local libraries where she read it aloud to groups of children who related to the book through their own experiences at the dentist office.

   McCabe incorporated her cooking expertise with her experiences at the Genesee Country Village by creating a family fun pack of historical games and recipes aimed at engaging younger children who tour the 19th century village and help them to understand what information the interpreter is presenting, especially relating to food. She borrowed 19th century recipes and coupled them with games she created such as word searches, crossword, fact or fiction and "what’s wrong with this picture" activities. The family fun packs are distributed to children at admissions.

   Both young ladies say that girl scouting has been a tremendous joy in their lives. They say that scouting has brought them closer to their community and has fostered an appreciation for service to others. They will carry their fond memories of camping and all that they learned from those outdoor experiences with them for a lifetime. Shaw and McCabe are both making application for adult/lifetime status as Girl Scouts and say they’d like to become troop leaders someday.

   McCabe will receive her diploma from Caledonia-Mumford High School this June although she completed her freshman year of college at Johnson and Wales this May. She is the daughter of Patrick and Charlotte McCabe.

   Shaw will also graduate from Cal-Mum High School in June and plans to study early childhood education at Roberts Wesleyan College in the fall. She is the daughter of David and Linda Shaw.