Cub Scouts Outdoor Activity Award

Cub Scout Outdoor Activity Award

Ok, so this is an award your cub scout can earn each year.

The 1st time they earn it, it will be a pocket flap award. This needs to be worn on the right side pocket. And from what I have read, every year after that, when earned, it will be a wolf track pin.

Now, how do you earn this?

http://www.scouting.org/Home/CubScouts/Leaders/Awards/CSOutdoorActivityAward.aspx

Here is a link that shows what each cub scout rank has to do to earn it. 

I have a Tiger, so that's what I will be talking about.

So, 1st, the tiger scout MUST finish his BackYard Jungle adventure.  It says he should do this at a camp. Then he has to do 4 of the following outdoor activities.

Here is the list from the scouting website:

Outdoor Activities

These activities must be in addition to any similar activities counted for rank advancement, and can be accomplished as a family, den, or pack.

• Participate in a nature hike in your local area. This can be on an organized, marked trail or just a hike to observe nature in your area.
• Participate in an outdoor activity such as a picnic or park fun day.
• Explain the buddy system and tell what to do if lost. Explain the importance of cooperation.
• Attend a pack overnighter. Be responsible by being prepared for the event.
• Complete an outdoor service project in your community.
• Complete a nature/conservation project in your area. This project should involve improving, beautifying, or supporting natural habitats. Discuss how this project helped you to respect nature.
• Earn the Summertime Pack Award.
• Participate in a nature observation activity. Describe or illustrate and display your observations at a den or pack meeting.
• Participate in an outdoor aquatics activity. This can be an organized swim meet or just a den, pack, or family swim.
• Participate in an outdoor campfire program. Perform in a skit, sing a song, or take part in a ceremony.
• Participate in an outdoor sporting event.
• Participate in an outdoor interfaith or other worship service.
• Explore a local city, county, state, or national park. Discuss with your den how a good citizen obeys the park rules.
• Invent an outside game and play it outside with friends for 30 minutes.

Easy, right? 

Lastly, let your den leader know you are finished with it. I just let our Den leader know about this 2 days ago. She will be contacting our pack leader's wife, who will then, hopefully, let us know if another step must be taken. If there is, I'll post it here.

Good luck and have fun doing this!

Fun With Son 2015 at Bavoy Scout Ranch

Fun with Son 2015

at Bavoy Scout Ranch

There are many activities and opportunities with your scout. I subscribed to my council's Facebook page and they post all kinds of things. Activities, camp outs, ideas, you name it and it is there.

One such thing was the Fun with Son Camp, which was one day of activity, followed by a camp fire and some boy scouts doing skits and cheers, then sleep in your tent. Next day we had some things too but check out was at 9am.  For $24 a person, you get a lot of stuff.

So, for us, we stayed Saturday to Sunday. Check in was 12-2pm. We got there around 1:30 pm. When you get there, they have packets that include a colored wristband ( ours was green because we were team hulk!), your scout's badge, a activity schedule, a map and some other stuff. We went to our campsite right away and set up our massive 8 person tent. I would suggest a smaller tent, it took forever to put up and to take down. Most people had a 2-3 person tent which I was envious of. 

So then after putting our tent up, we hiked to our 1st activity scheduled, which was BB guns. Parents get to lay down with their child on a map and help them pump and shoot a BB gun. We could also do the "wrist rockets" which were sling shots but my son didn't want to.

Next activity was leather works and catapults. The kids received a leather bracelet, which they got to "stamp" designs and letters into it by hammering certain metal stamps into the leather. My son chose to put a tiger head with the words BEWARE. Then he went to make a catapult out of a spoon, rubber bands, and Popsicle sticks. Note: all the activities really required a parents help for the tigers. 

After that, we went to make rockets out of paper and tape. They used a pipe to get the right size so that it could blast off. My husband enjoyed this the best because they worked as a team at 1st. Then he had the bright idea to design his own and talked smack about how he was going to beat my son's rocket. Other parents laughed at him smack talking to a 6 year old, whose rocket was built by my husband also. They had a blast trying to see who could go farther and highest! My husband now wants to do this activity at my son's birthday party.

So now we came to the part that my son loved, which was to make his own hero costume. He made a cape, a mask and a shield. He actually lost his shield while making his cape, so Mommy had to jump in and make another for him. But while I was working on another Captain America shield, he was helping the person running that area by picking up markers and paper off the ground.

And last activity before dinner was archery. I'll be honest, my son needed help on that too. He couldn't pull back the string and aim. The 1st three arrows landed in different parts of the grass, then the 4th, with my husbands help, had a bulls-eye. So now my husband is into that too...LOL

During all these activities, there is a tent that has goldfish snacks, cold caprisons, and bottled water that we could go to at anytime to re hydrate. 

Ok, after those activities, we headed back to the tent for an hour, where the kids who were complaining for the last hour about how much they walked, miraculously had a burst of energy. They climbed stuff, played with other scouts, ran around, played with these flyer things that the ranch gave every boy...while we parents sat on the ground or chair and just watched, exhausted.

We let him play for a while but my husband went to Walmart to pick up worms so that we could fish. So as soon as he came back, we drove down to the catch and release lake. It was really nice. My son caught 3 little perch and released them. We fished while noticing other dens were there with lots of their kids, playing games or doing stuff as a den. 

We had our other member from our little den there too but really didn't interact much. I won't lie, some people it requires me to search my brain for something to say. It then makes me uncomfortable and feel kind of forced, so I would rather do the small talk for 10 min and just walk away.  Nothing to do with the person in general. I didn't know him so well, so it was just forced. Matter of fact, I tried to call his wife to ask if she wanted me to take pics of her son and hubby but I had NO reception   ( warning to Sprint Users). And thought it might be a little weird to take pictures of them without getting her permission, so I didn't. 

Dinner was set as a cafeteria thing. You wait in line, get your food, sit at a table and eat. My son hated the whole dinner so he ate a fresh apple. He didn't even like the cake. I thought it was ok but I was starving. We had chicken fried chicken, mashed potatoes, green beans, gravy and cake.

After dinner, we went back to the tent to chill for a little while before heading over to the camp fire area. It was fun. We had 4 boy scouts there doing cheers and skits. I felt like I was back in a high school pep rally. My son had a blast! Even the cheers were the same that our cheerleaders did..LOL Towards the end, the kids received a glow necklace, which everyone loved. Then we went to the tent and stared at the stars fro about an hour. Most of our little campsite went to sleep but other sites were playing and laughing, playing music, and just having fun. But my little family took the cover off the tent and just looked at the different stars. Do you know, you can see a lot of satellites? I remember when I was a kid, you never saw them. But we picked out so many, it actually made me kind of sad. Won't give up my DirecTV though...LOL. But that's how we fell asleep, mu husband, my son and I looking at the stars on a beautiful clear night.

The next morning, my husband and I woke around 5:30 am. He was freezing! I was actually warm in my little sleeping bag. So he went to the car with the heater, then I really wanted a coffee and he drove 22 miles to get me a Starbucks coffee. True Love! Especially since he didn't tell me how far he was going to drive to get it. In that time, I woke my son, ate breakfast around 6:50am and just walked around afterward waiting for daddy. When Daddy arrived, we went to the little store they had, bought some really great root beer, my son got a hiking stick and some decorations for it and arrowheads. Went back to camp, where everyone already packed up and started our own packing. Check out was at 9am and they had some flag ceremony at 9:30. We didn't wait around but after checkout, we left. 

Here is the badge and the certificate that my son received. If you notice, super heroes signed it, which to my son, it is SO AWESOME!. His words,,LOL

So yes, this camp was well worth it! He also has a shirt that says Fun With Son on it.

My Family's Duty to God belt loop (Needed)

My Family's Duty to God!

Well, I'm sure this will bring some feed back..LOL

With the scouts, they support every religion out there. That way ALL boys can be a part of them. 

So, for Requirement 1, the scout has to find out what duty to God means to his family. I sat with my son and explained to him that God is very important to us. Also, I explained that to us, it means LOVE.  So, when I asked him to draw a picture, he drew Daddy, him and I together.

Requirement 2- Find out what makes each member of your family important.

So he wrote about him, me, Daddy, Grandma and Granny. He had to write what their strengths are and draw a symbol next to their row. 

Requirement 3- Make a project that shows your family's beliefs about God.

Well, I had Gold poster board ( I wouldn't suggest it) and he did some crafts on it. He drew a cross with silver stones under it. He drew his version of the devil/evil. He also drew the symbols that he made for everyone. 

Requirement 4- Participate in a worship ceremony... We haven't got around to that.

BUT!!!!

You HAVE to do #1 and then select 2 requirements from 2-4 to do. So really, he is finished. Requirements 1-3 are done.

Games Tigers Play- 2nd belt loop ( Needed)

Games Tigers Play

Honestly, we signed up for Tiger Day, which did most of the requirements for this adventure.
You can find out more by looking at my post on it.
Tiger Day!
It covers these requirements!

Requirement 1A

Requirement 1B

Requirement 1C

Requirement 2

Requirement 3

Requirement 4 asks for you to go to a sporting event and ask the coach/player question. We went  to a Junior High Football game ( we are in Texas and everyone loves football!). One of our old neighbors ( a friend from my son)  plays football for the team so we asked the parents if he can interview him at the game. They said sure. So we rushed over there ( which was over 40 min drive) and still was late. But we got to see most of the game! My son was more interested in playing with the younger siblings, who he hasn't seen in about 6 months. I don't like using names on my blog but we did get to watch #41 play, who we found out was the captain of that team. And since we couldn't interview him before the game, he was nice enough to let my son call later that evening and ask him 2 questions.
Why do you like playing football? Answer: It is fun. ( my son won't try because he doesn't want to get hit...LOL)
What do you do to get ready for a game? Answer: we get our pads and jerseys on. Then if it is an away game, we get on the bus to go play.
His team lost this game but won the last. We still said it was a great game and we had fun. Then we thanked him for allowing us to go and he thanked us for coming. ( These kids have the best manners. Their parents raised them right!)

And after the game, we had sushi! So it was a win/win for us.

Requirement 5 asks that you bring a nutritious snack to a den meeting. Well, at our last den meeting, my son brought pretzels because it was a healthy alternative snack. 

Make sure to ask the den leader what kind of allergies the kids have. We only have 2 boys in our den so it was easy. And the other scout had to make up a game for our den, that way both boys got to sign off on something. 

BackYard Jungle- Tigers 1st belt loops (Needed) with BSA Modifications

Backyard Jungle Requirement

*The BSA has modified the handbooks to make it easier for scouts to reach their goal.
So according to the Modification - you HAVE to do #5 plus at least 2 others.
So instead of doing 5 requirements you will only do 3 of them. Nice!

The 1 ft hike.

This is the 1st Tiger requirement in the Tiger handbook.

Being  me, I almost made it more complicated than need be.

I wanted to take him hiking and do it. But we haven't had an opportunity in the last month and a half, so we did it in our front yard.

I let him choose 2 spots to try to get more stuff. Since most people in Texas treat their yards, it was hard to find any bugs. But my son found a feather, some grass that looked eaten, an acorn that was eaten, squirrels in the tree above, and frogs.

So to me, that was his 1 foot hike in the city.

I also made him write everything down so that he could remember. And took lots of pictures to help document everything.

2nd requirement- Point out 2 different kinds of birds that live in your area.

This one is easy. We did this one morning while walking to the bus stop. We looked at every tree and powerline until we found 2 different birds. Ours were a scissortail and a pigeon. It was hard for my son to get a real good look at it, so I made him go online to see better pictures. The whole "listen to the bid. What sounds are they making?" Yeah, we couldn't really hear them individually.

Requirement 3- Plant a tree or plant in your neighborhood

We are staying at family's house right now so it's not exactly like you can just say, hey I'm going to plant a tree. And our neighborhood has a country club so I thought maybe they wouldn't appreciate it if my son planted a plant. So my son planted a peach seed in the back yard. Chances of it growing are slim to none but he was super excited to do it. I also had some seeds for Texas wild flowers, so he will be planting that in a pot that we have.

Requirement 4- Build and Hang a Birdhouse

I wrote a whole post on this. Here is the link.
http://cubscouttigermom.blogspot.com/2015/10/cub-scout-crafts-birdhouse-out-of-carton.html
Here is a picture:

Requirement 5- Go on a walk and pick out 2 different sounds you hear in your jungle
Super easy. Before school, we walk to the bus stop. We heard a mower, birds, squirrels, cars, the bus, the wind rustling the leaves, a swing chain clinking every time he swung...There were a lot of sounds in 15 minutes. And since we go out every evening selling popcorn, we listened one evening just for giggles. He heard crickets and birds and other stuff.

And that is how my son earned his Backyard jungle belt loop!

And yes, you need this so that your son can get his tiger badge.
What is the point? So that your scout can get to know his "backyard" or his neighborhood. To show that you don't have to go to a forest to see wild animals. To appreciate his surroundings.
So go out and have some fun exploring your own back yard jungle!


How do you make your scout memorable for next year sales?

Reminders of Popcorn Delivery

 

 

Ok, so I want people who bought popcorn from my son to remember him for next year.

How do you make 1 scout memorable from millions?

That was a hard question for me to figure out. But I figured that the more they saw him, the better luck he would have.

So I made these little reminders. I made them on my phone and sent them into walmart online to be printed. I had to change the size from 4 x 6 to a more square print but I'm ok with that.

 

 

So I cut these up and used a hole puncher in the corner, put twine through it and tied a knot.

 

Now I'm sure you are wondering what to do with this... here it is:

 

The picture actually says:

Reminder: Popcorn will be delivered the week of Nov 22nd. Thank you!

 

And I will start passing them out on October 22nd. I had quite a few people worried that they were being scammed. So I wanted to basically put their minds at ease, letting them know that the popcorn WILL be delivered. Also, I thought it would be a nice, personal touch to let people know we appreciate them.

Do you have to do it? NO! Actually, I don't know one person who has done it.

Is the extra money spent on this worth it? Not a clue!

How many did I make? 16 prints, that cost about $6. So that makes 96 door hangers.

Did I need so many? No but LJ already has 90 customers in the neighborhood.

Will my son be hanging them? No, I will be doing it while he is at school. It's 90 different houses. That would take him forever.

Will they be thrown in the trash afterwards? Probably.

Do people actually care? I don't know. But I do know that my son brought tears to one customer. In a good way...(proud Mama right here!)

 

Now when it comes time to deliver the product, I will make sure my son writes a personal message to the customers. It might only be one note that its copied...lol.. that's a lot of personal notes to write and I don't think I can make him sit and actually do that many.

 

So here is to hoping that this will bring smiles on to our customers faces.



Make an easy to read tiger requirement chart!

I have mentioned this before but I am the one that usually keeps track of what my son does in scouts. What requirement should he do today? How to make it fun?
But Wednesday my son finally received some belt loops and his bobcat badge.He was super excited!

He had me ( yes, me) sew on his bobcat badge so that he could show it off to popcorn customers. He also noticed one of his loops were gold! So, I figured that maybe all his required achievements to become a Tiger may have the gold belt loop. Now he is really excited to get the next one.. but he asked if I could make a chart for him, showing what requirements he has left to do.
So this morning around 6am, I finally made him his chart.
What do you think?

I think it will be easier to visualize what he needs to do next. And I am hoping it will motivate him to want to do it!
What can I say, my baby loves gold. LOL
Also, BSA came out with a  amended version where the boys dont have to do everything in the book for requirements. You can find paper versions at your scout shop for free. Use it. It will make your life easier. Lol

What to do if your scout can't go camping with his den?

This weekend was supposed to be our 1st camping trip with our pack but my son had a stomach virus that shot projectile vomit everywhere Friday.

He seemed fine Saturday BUT I didn't want to chance other kids getting it, so we stayed home. 

He was so disappointed!

Friday I had also built this big dome tent that fits 10 people in the back yard. When my son was sick all night Friday, I never had a chance to bring it down. 

So I promised that if he wasn't throwing up, that we could go camping in the back yard.

Well, guess what we did last night? Yup, camped out in the back yard!

My son, my niece, granny, daddy and I all slept in that tent last night. The kids stayed in there from 6:30 pm,, playing with toys, then later with Ipads when it was dark. We adults knew it would be boring for us, so we stayed inside until 9pm, watching TV.   No, we had no fire because I really didn't want to burn my grass and I was NOT going out and buying a fire pit. So there was no campfire songs, smores or scary stories. It was what some might call " comfy camping" or "lazy camping."
I have already signed up for a camp out that is not with our pack, so I'm not terribly worried about my son not completing his campfire requirement. We will just do that later!
But we did "try" to look at the stars. Yeah, in the city, you don't see a lot of stars. So that was a bust.
But, my son didn't feel so bad about missing his camping trip. That little effort really went a long way in cheering him up!

I knew his den was going to work on the " Tigers in the Wild" requirements, so the next day, we set out for a "hike." We have a small drainage/bayou in the back of the house, which was going to be our hiking place. We walked out the back gate and walked all the way around the area so that we could find our way to the front door. He had his backpack filled with hiking essentials ( Requirement 1). He carried his own bag ( Requirement 2). We stopped ans read the Outdoor Code an discussed what that meant ( Requirement 3). We stopped and discussed the Leave no trace behind principles for kids ( Requirement 3B). We looked at the animals and plants that we could see. That mainly consisted of bees, flowers and birds. I look pictures of whatever we could find.

That will help with Requirements 3C, 4 and 6. Requirement 5 will be done at the Sam Houston Camp out and #7 will be done on open day at Saint Francis Wolf Sanctuary. So by the end of October, he will be done with Tigers in the Wild!
So even if your child can NOT make your pack's camping trip, remember they can still find a different way to get the requirements done! And set up your tent in the backyard every now and then, your kids will love you for it!

Cub Scout Crafts- Birdhouse out of a carton!

• This is a craft that is required for your cub scout to get his Back Yard Jungle Adventure Loop! It is on page 39 of his Tiger Handbook.

I am one of those people that have read this Tiger Handbook so many times.

When I saw the birdhouse, I think I was more excited than my son!

Well, I saved a carton from a creamer that we had used, washing it out thoroughly. Then I let it dry on the window seal and forgot about it. 

Then the den leader sent us the list of stuff we were scheduled to do and the birdhouse making was on the list. But I already had that carton... so why not let him make it and then he can make one with his den later in November?

 It gave him something to do for scouts besides just selling popcorn right now. And it was fun!

So I asked what color paint he wanted ( green and blue) and went to Walmart. Well, the paint was 50 cents each. So, I, being who I am, bought blue, green, black and orange. Then they had some wire for $1 and some beads for $1.

When my son came home, he finished his Thursday homework ( school is always 1st!) then he started. Now you can buy a birdhouse kit at most stores, but I wanted to teach him about recycling old stuff and making new stuff. Plus I am a very crafty person! And the directions for the carton birdhouse is right in the book!

We started by wrapping it with 1 inch masking tape. That was aggravating for both of us and so time consuming! So be warned and get one that is thicker...

Next, my son wanted to use the blue/green but I said the word "tigers" and that is what he wanted to do. He painted the whole thing orange and I made him let it dry. That was my excuse to get him to sell some popcorn for an hour.

When we came back, he couldn't figure out how to paint stripes. So, I outlined it and he painted it in with black.

But what about a tiger face? That was the one thing he was insistent on. Well, mommy sure didn't want to free hand a tiger because I know it would have turned out bad. But 2 weeks ago I had bought these tiger cub stickers at the scout store. A whole sheet for 8 cents! And guess what mommy suggested? That's right! Let's stick a sticker of the tiger cub on it. He was all for it.

And today we just put on the Mod Podge ( for outdoor use) to let it be a little more durable. It is now hanging outside in our tree!

I hope you enjoy doing this craft with your little one!

Go Tigers!

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