Summer Fun with the Girlies
Research shows that girls and young women need supportive relationships in order to thrive. REACH is designed to do just that!
This month, July 2012, has been dedicated to bringing the young women who participated in our REACH Curves Fitness Program together and strengthen the bond we builded during those amazing eight weeks.
One of the most random, but turned out to be really awesome, adventure we had as a group was last weekend's outing to downtown Los Altos, CA. Where the heck is that you ask? It is a small town in Silicon Valley. Our intention was to get together and do something fun like get dinner and a movie, but when we got to our destination, the entire downtown was closed off to set up a wine and art festival the following day! The streets were practically empty and everything was closed except for a few cafes.
Many people would have called it quits and gone home. But not us! We saw this as an opportunity for a ton of fun to happen. We took out our cameras and owned the streets! We turned these empty streets into our stage, and had a mini photo shoot capturing a lovely summer evening.
After exploring this empty downtown, we found a nail salon open. The coolest thing about it was that we had the salon to ourselves. It felt like we had a V.I.P. nail art party without expecting it! All the girls got to choose thier nail polish color and got manicures. We didn't have that dinner and movie experience that we wanted due to things that were out of our control, but we ended up having a better time because of it. Getting manicures done gave us a better opportunity to catch up, bond, and learn more about the girls.
Part of mentoring a specific cohort like this one, is consistency and communication. At REACH we strive to nurture relationships that we build with our students and mentors through consistency and communication. After this outing, we found that the girls were more comfortable interacting with all of the group members. When we first meet some of the ladies, a few of them were very shy. When we meet again, those girls were more talkative and engaged. We are proud to see that there have been improvement in the girls self esteem and social interactions. Girl Power!
For more information about REACH or if you are interested in joining us visit our website www.reachforyou.org or Like us on REACH's Facebook to join the fun!
