Our Journey Through Tiger Cub Scouting - October 2008 About This Page:

[christiejay]

Originally Posted by Colexis Mom

Glad things are going well!! I still owe you that picture!! Hopefully this weekend. Colin also got his Tiger Paw with the beads hanging down at the meeting last night (I guess during the campout they got a bunch of things accomplished)!!

They have their rocket launch on Sunday morning, and then next week or the week after a rain gutter regatta (they make some sort of boat). It's still in the box, so no pictures They did make a great scrapbooking page yesterday.....I'm not a scrapbooker, but I guess there is Tiger Cub paper out there, and he had a picture of himself in uniform, plus some pictures from the hike and campout, and then he addeda bunch of embelishements! It's so cute!!

Sounds like he's been busy! That was another thing those two boys earned from day camp, was a patch for participating in the raingutter regatta.

Yeah, I've seen all the cub scout scrapbooking stuff. They had a few kits of paper, stickers, etc. at our local scout shop. It looks really cool and I'm sure I will get started on that one day, just not right now. Our store had a pack for Tiger Cubs, a pack for Cub Scouts in general and a pack for Boy Scouts. What I'm really waiting for is a trip back to Branson. That scrapbook store I went to on our last visit had tons of Scout stuff.

Speaking of scrapbook stuff the official Scout Stuff website has a fair selection, if only you can stand their shipping costs!

Here's another shop I found that carries some of the same stuff, at more reasonable shipping costs:
Scouting Scrapbooking from ScoutingBooks.com: www.ScoutingBooks.com - Scout books and gifts

[christiejay]

Wednesday, October 15

Bought some washable paints and a simple paintbrush set at Wal-Mart for Joshua to use in his various projects. I sense a lot of poster-making coming up.

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Since Joshua's library book is due back tomorrow, I asked him to read it to me. This counts for Elective #14, Reading Fun. I signed off on this in his book, but he can't color a paw print until he has completed ten electives. But we were able to write the number into the smaller paw prints along the way ...

For every ten electives they complete, they earn a yellow disc-shaped bead. However, these can not be awarded until their Tiger Badge is earned. But it is fine for them to work on the electives at any time.

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We discussed how we would create his sculpture. (I don't think I've mentioned the details on this have I?) At school they read Charlotte's Web. The class project is to write some descriptive words about their favorite character and use those words to make sentences for a simple report about that character. Joshua chose Charlotte. It was like pulling teeth to get him to come up with eight descriptive words. The other part of the project is to create the character using any medium except pictures from the internet.

Tomorrow when we have more time we will make a sculpture of Charlotte using wood. My idea is to take a small block of wood and have Joshua sand it down a little, then paint it black. I was thinking of using nails as the legs, but we will see if he can come up with any other ideas. He wants to use wood for all of it, I'm just trying to think of how to make the legs from wood so they're not too brittle. I'll let you know how it all turns out.

[Colexis Mom]

Good luck with the sculpture. Here are the pictures....

[christiejay]

Very cool pack lanyard! Thanks for sharing ... one of these days I will post some pictures. Now that Jay's work schedule has changed he is starting to take a few pictures with his digital camera, and hopefully I can share some of them. I've been using my regular film camera for the few scout pictures I've taken so far, since it's pictures I knew I wanted to print out.

[christiejay]

Thursday October 16

Time to create a sculpture for the Charlotte's Web project. Jay cut off a square of wood from a scrap piece in the garage and sanded most of the splinters off. Then Joshua continued sanding it a little more. Found an old wooden handle that I think used to go to a shovel. Jay sliced a piece off it to use for the head of the spider. Joshua sanded it also, then showed Jay where it should be attached. Next was the legs. We agreed that wooden legs would be too brittle and too hard to attach. I had thought we should use nails, but Jay didn't have any that would be long enough. Instead he brought out some screws. Joshua marked where he wanted the legs to go, and Jay started putting them in. I kept reminding Jay that Joshua should be helping, and eventually he helped Joshua operate the cordless screwdriver to put them in.

Jay said we didn't have any more black paint so he went to buy a can of spray paint. I thought the pack of paint I bought Joshua yesterday had black in it, but it didn't. When the body dried, Joshua used blue paint to give her some eyes and white paint to make a mouth. It turned out okay. It would be interesting to see all of the kid's creations together.

Anyway, to remind you why I'm throwing a school project in here, it will count toward his art award in scouts. We still need to backtrack to earn the first few requirements. No school on Monday since it is parent-teacher conference day, so maybe I will get Joshua online to learn some basics of art to fill out his worksheets.

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Saturday, October 18
Nissan Family Day

This is Nissan's version of a company picnic. They hire a small carnival company to bring in some rides, and also set up some games and inflatables. They cook burgers, hot dogs and chicken patties for lunch, and also hand out popcorn, cotton candy and soft drinks all day long.

We went to the health fair tent first because Jay wanted to get his cholesterol checked. Next was lunch, then some inflatable slides. A few rides for Jay and Joshua while I opted to snack on popcorn instead. More inflatables and a few games, then a little playground time and it was all over!

This activity was counted as one of ten needed for the BSA Family award.

[Colexis Mom]

Sounds like fun Christie!

We had a good time at the rocket launch (although it was freezing)!! It was cool to see all the different rockets, and to watch them all go up. A bunch were lost, since it was so windy, and they just drifted off into the woods or worse yet, the main road!! Colin got another "bead" for his pack lanyard (the blue one), which I guess is for every pack event you attend, you get a bead! The things you learn when the den leader is around (since I never go to meetings and don't get to see her)!!

[christiejay]

Originally Posted by Colexis Mom

Sounds like fun Christie!

We had a good time at the rocket launch (although it was freezing)!! It was cool to see all the different rockets, and to watch them all go up. A bunch were lost, since it was so windy, and they just drifted off into the woods or worse yet, the main road!!

It sounds like fun, though. I think the only thing our pack does is the pinewood derby. Things like this would go over better if our pack was larger, I believe. Maybe over the next few years membership will pick up and a better variety of acitivites will be offered.

Colin got another "bead" for his pack lanyard (the blue one), which I guess is for every pack event you attend, you get a bead! The things you learn when the den leader is around (since I never go to meetings and don't get to see her)!!

Yeah, even though Jay is now able to attend the meetings, I'm still going to keep going so I don't miss out on any info. Of course, I'm the registered adult partner for Joshua so I guess I'm in it anyway!

[Joanne929]

[quote=christiejay;2355256]

Since I plan for Joshua to start earning some belt loop awards this year in the academics and sports program, I figured we better go ahead and buy him a belt to put the loops on. I saw on the online store that the smallest size belt is a little cheaper than the next size up, hopefully he can fit into the smaller one to save a couple of dollars.

I also wanted to pick up our own copy of the guidebook for this program. I'm sure the pack leaders have one that we could make copies from, but due to my control issues I think it will work best for us if we have our own copy.

You can get this online as well, which I always found helpful http://http://www.usscouts.org/usscouts/advance/cubscout/academics/art.asp. This is just one site you can use.

[christiejay]

Thanks, Joanne! I do visit that website from time to time, and I also like this one: Beltloops and Pins requirements for its links to sites that can help fulfill the requirements. I actually found lots of websites that list these requirements, but we went ahead and bought the book so I can have something to mark up as we go through it. Speaking of ... we need to get moving on some of those things while it's a slow time for our den meetings.

[christiejay]

Thursday, October 23

Realized I haven't been doing much Scout-related stuff lately, so I pulled out Joshua's handbook to pick something. I decided on Elective 23 - find out what kind of milk your family drinks and why.

So this was pretty easy. I explained (briefly) the different kinds of milk, and which we prefer. I went over some of the reasons we buy the kind of milk we buy, like the kind of container and whether we should get a full gallon that week or just half a gallon. Went over expiration dates and the different kinds of containers available, and that our city will recycle the plastic jugs like we buy.

A short and sweet activity.

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Saturday, October 25
Pack Field Trip

Today some of the scouts from our pack met up and went over to Jackson to visit the Natural Science Museum. I haven't visited here since they moved into the new building which has been several years now. I was very impressed with the facilities! This morning they were having a special event about spiders, snakes and bats. It wasn't very much so I was a little disappointed. One lady had a snake that the kids could touch, but she didn't stay out with it very long. They had some of their student volunteers helping the kids make crafts. They had gold-colored pipe cleaners cut into lengths, they twisted them together to make a spider's 8 legs, then taped it to a string. Wonder why they didn't use black pipe cleaners? Then, at another table they used circles of brown construction paper to cut and tape together into a bat which also went onto a string. Very simple.

The current special exhibit was dinosaurs - they had several animatronic dinosaurs on display that were very nice, although I was expecting something a bit more. This rotating exhibit space is pretty small. They had six plates that the kids could put paper over and rub with a crayon to make dinosaur skeleton rubbings, so that was neat.

Onto the regular exhibits. You travel down a long hallway - one side has aquarium tanks and the other side has recreations of various habitats found in Mississippi. A diver went into one of the larger aquarium tanks and fed the fish. Joshua really got into trying to identify the fish with the signs that were posted next to each tank. As for the habitats, we tried to see who could find the most animals in each display. I was disappointed that these displays did not have the animals marked.

At the end of the hallway you pass through a couple of sets of doors to a "terrarium" where there are a couple of tanks of turtles, fish and alligators and a smaller tank that is home to a gigantic alligator snapping turtle. Back inside you go down a parallel hallway that leads back toward the entrance. This hallway contains a few interactive exhibits as well as some collections of skeletons, insects, etc. Also a honeybee hive.

There are several short, interconnected trails out back but we were leaving from here to head down to my parents' house for the rest of the day so we didn't even go out there. We will be back, though, and will have a chance to walk the trails. I was really surprised at how much Joshua got into all the displays today. Maybe we'll visit the Ripley's Aquarium in Gatlinburg next summer after all ...

Noticed on our way in, there is a disc golf course set up in the park here, will have to come back for that as we plan to work toward the Ultimate/Disc Golf belt loop. That should be fun. Also, since about 1/3 of the exhibits at the museum were aquarium exhibits, I wonder if that would count as visiting an aquarium? That is one of their electives, so it would be nice to be able to count it. Of course the same elective also has the option of visiting the zoo, but I'm kind of tired of our little zoo and was hoping to avoid visiting it. Unless the whole pack goes, of course. We'll see.

[christiejay]

Oops - I forgot something! I think this happened on ...

Wednesday, October 22

Decided we needed to backtrack on Joshua's art recognition. Since we've already done 2 of the 6 requirements for the pin, I think we need to go back to do the requirements for the belt loop, which you have to earn before you can be awarded the pin.

The first requirement is to make a list of commonly used materials. So I had spent all this time looking for an appropriate kid's reference book (out of the ones we have at home) or for a simple website that he could read and understand himself. Then I realized I was way overthinking this, and decided to just sit down and ask him about it. I told him to think about the different art projects he has done in his art class, in his regular class, and the projects he had just completed. He came up with this list of materials:

pencils
paintbrushes
crayons
paper
glue
scissors
paint
wood
clay

That was good enough for me! However the next one will be a little more involved. He has to demonstrate how 6 of the elements of design are used in a drawing. There are 10 to choose from. I assume this means he needs to learn a little about each one, then create a drawing using at least 6 of the elements. There was a good elementary-level website listed, though, so hopefully that will be enough to help him out. Hopefully we can work on this one soon, as the third requirement is very simple. Then he can be awarded his first belt loop!

[Colexis Mom]

Great updates Christie!!

[christiejay]

Monday, October 27
Pack Meeting/Halloween Party

Everyone had signed up previously to bring food or drink for tonight, and the boys were told they could wear their costumes.

Started off with the opening ceremony, then a quick announcement about what was planned for the evening. Then we hit the food table! There were BBQ weinies, pigs in blankets, meatballs, cookies, chips and dip, and cake. Snack mix, bags of candy for the boys, PB&J sandwiches cut with a pumpkin-shaped cookie cutter. Really yummy. Once everybody had been through the line, I even went back for more.

After eating the boys got to play some games and receive candy in return. There were four games set up. 1. Ring toss 2. fishing pond 3. standing long jump 4. basket toss

Once it appeared that all the boys had a chance to visit all the game stations everybody came back to the meeting room and the boys took turns wrapping their den leaders to turn them into mummies. Between Webelos and Bears, the Webelos won. And between the Tigers and Wolves the Wolves won. The members of the winning dens received little trinket-type prizes.

There had been a costume contest, so the top 3 winners were announced. I was disappointed to see that all 3 winners were wearing store-bought costumes. There were some really creative ones that deserved to win. My favorites: one of the boys was wearing football pads and a jersey - taped on the back of his jersey was an over-sized quarter - get it? quarterback! His mom used yellow tape to create a name on the back of her shirt that said "running" - get it? running back! And my other favorite was a boy that had taped packages of Smarties all over his jogging pants. Get it? Smarty pants! I found out later that it was a teenager who judged the costumes, that explains why the Star Wars guys won. They really shouldn't allow store-bought costumes to participate in costume contests. Anyway moving on ...

At the end of the meeting a couple more announcements to remind people to bring their popcorn order forms and money next week. And then I was expecting to hear the details about our work day at the Nature Center, but it didn't look like Tim was going to mention it. So I asked him what time we needed to meet, and he came over and said he forgot about it and had to work this weekend! Sheesh! So our work day has been postponed to an unknown date.

The boys did their closing ceremony and another exciting meeting drew to a close.

[Colexis Mom]

Sounds like a great Halloween party!!

[christiejay]

Originally Posted by Colexis Mom

Sounds like a great Halloween party!!

Yeah, it was pretty fun for a change of pace. And Jay reminded me that a homemade mummy was the winner of the costume contest, so at least one of the three was not store-bought. (2nd place was Anakin Skywalker, 3rd place was Darth Vader.)