5yearscouter

You do need to touch base with your pack committee chair about what the pack rules for popcorn profit are. talk to them about what that % is earmarked for in the budget--it may cover the cost of all the awards and then not be enough to cover more than that. And talk about incentives. You may not have a budget to work with to award anything else over top of what the council provides. also check how the dates for popcorn sales fit into the pack calendar(calendar for next year may not be completed yet). it makes no sense to work so hard for show and sell if it falls on the weekends of the

We order less popcorn for show and sell than what we sold for take orders. concentrating on the cheapest $10 popcorn, a case or so of microwave popcorn, and the cheese popcorn 3 pack for $30 is individually labelled bags inside so we could sell each one for $10 to have some variety. so if we sold 20 cases of the cheapest popcorn for the take orders last year, we might buy 20 cases for show and sell--knowing what we don't sell in front of the stores, we can use to fill the take order sales. note the first year we did the show and sell, our take order #'s went down considerably, beca

So far we have June calendar planning, trying to find a place to do it so we can have a bbq or pot luck meal to get more parents to want to come. day camp, all but 2 scouts in the pack are attending. wish those 2 would go as well! a week after day camp we'll have water wars, bring a 24 pack of bottled water, and your water guns, super soakers, and water balloons and have a water war. then donate the bottled water to the homeless shelter. July more people seem to go on vacation so far we only have planned AZ science center group rate $6 for admission $2 for plan

Alton brown has a whole cooking show on Good Eats about the box fan dehydrating system.

yeah you always got the cup of noodles to fall back on. They were on sale for 27 cents at the grocery store, so it's pretty hard to justify buying the dehydrated meals at $5-10 each and they aren't all that much tastier. I think it's the walmart or maybe kroger brand instant oatmeal that comes in a foil packet so you can just add hot water and eat. add in some dried fruit and the oatmeal gets a hearty boost. last backpacking trip my boys went together, so they took a miniature frying pan, froze up some eggs in a water bottle to make scrambled eggs and toast the first morning with

Sometimes all it takes to take the wind out of the sales of a prank is to tell the younger scouts to expect something, that the older guys may want to play a trick on them and try to scare them, but that you'll be watching out for them and it will be ok. make sure they all have GOOD flashlights or tent battery powered lights, that they each have a buddy in their tent or 3 to a tent at first if they are newbie/scared. And then tell the older boys that you told the new guys to expect a prank, but you know they aren't that mean to try to scare the new guys on their first campout. And sug

September is too late for us to do recruiting. The first day of school is slated for August 6th, and if we wait til Sept everyone will already be signed up for sports instead. So we have to send home flyers the first week of school, roundup either Aug 10th or 17th, although we have done the Weds in between but turnout is usually less even though that is the day of the week we meet. Recruiting is usually games and activities and get out the info about scouting. lots of paperwork, collect payments. One year we did it as a roundup theme, with roping a cow head, milking a cow(rubber

This keeps falling off the facebook or gets hidden or deleted when it gets too many negative comments I think. the big questions are these rules or guidelines do they apply to all of scouting, cubs, boy scouts, advancement, merit badges, do they apply to service projects troop wide, or for/with community groups, or just to eagle projects. I think some of the rules are absolute hogwash and reminds of the other post here "when the rules become the joke."

The funnest part I'm sooo looking forward to is the input of everyone's vehicle information. We have over 60 scouts, and that means 120 parents. During the course of the year, parents kind of share and rotate who drives, so just about everyone's information needs to be entered and clicked each time I guess. It takes more than just SM and ASM to transport everyone--well if each ASM was chosen only based on how large their vehicle is maybe, but they mostly have 3 passenger vehicles which is no help when we have a big turnout for a troop campout. don't ask about patrol campouts, this tro

We have a local explorer post that does ham radio and electronics. They set up at the annual ScoutORama scout fair and get a lot of participants. and they will come out to almost any camporee if asked far enough in advance and work on ham radio and radio merit badge in addition to some electronics or electricity merit badge stuff. You may get the whole badges done there but not usually complete. That's where my husband and oldest got interested in Ham radio so they are dual registered in a troop and the explorer post.

oldest has turned into the jolly green giant, totally outgrowing his backpacking backpack, and he's going to Philmont in June. so we spent some time at REI trying on backpacks and checking out prices and brands. Then went to the scout shop, which had the brand and size he wanted and bought the backpack with no taxes and it was already about 10% less cost. I NEVER thought I'd find the scout shop having that good of prices on good quality stuff.

Be prepared for the Zombie Apocalypse!

http://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2012/05/01/check-the-bsas-tool-use-policy-before-your-next-service-project/comment-page-1/#comment-6583 Bryan was trying to answer questions. wonder how that's going to go for him?

Guess I'd have to register for Facebook to post a dislike over there. almost worthwhile. almost. I believe that it is not a good practice to compare the youth rules of a youth organization with the youth rules for a place such as habitat for humanity, which is an adult service organization, with the primary volunteers not youth, and no adults trained or experienced with overseeing youth. To compare the two organizations negates the fact that our primary focus as adults in a youth organiztion such as Boy Scout of America is work with youth to ensure their health and safety.

Oak tree made this nice list in the other thread: Hypothetical examples given by RichardB as a argument for why we need these rules: Re-roof the church steeple 24 foot ladder to scrape the lead paint off the light poles in the playground Clean gutters on the homes of the elderly in town as a fundraiser. Using a hand cart to move stacks of boxes off a semi trailer Floating air pumps and hoses used while diving a few feet Using a scaffold to go to the ceiling so he can change the lights. Digging into a gas line Having a roof collapse Dealing with asbestos Getting

I agree that the eagle candidate needs to get the right people with the right tools to get the job done, and OFTEN they do show leadership over the adults who are there to do the dangerous jobs. In that theme, I see nothing wrong with how things work right now. I do see a LOT wrong with the list of tools banned for use by scouts in RichardB's document. I do not believe the tools listed as requiring only those over 18 to use them, are a list of tools that only those over 18 can properly use. The tools are not the issue as much as the use or misuse of the tools that anyone of any a

And to annoyingly post 3 times in a row.... The church steeple was addressed in the other thread this was spun from. Those who approve eagle projects should have enough experience in these kinds of things to know that. Heck I'd prefer to have constructin projects need a quick check by someone in the construction industry, or a set of questions the eagle candidate must answer/research if they are doing a construction project if that is deemed such an unsafe area of responsbiliity. That would include questions of what is necesssary to determine lead paint, asbestos insulation,

The first thing is if these tool safety rules apply to scouting in only certain instances, that has to be spelled out. Richard B points to his statements in letters to the editor of boy's life http://scoutingmagazine.org/contact/letters-to-the-editor-about-our-november-december-2011-issue/ as evidence that the rules do not apply to merit badges? if so, that should be expressly spelled out. Do the rules apply to eagle projects only (scout led with minimal adult leadership, but most of the time a LOT of adult supervision to improve safety) or other community service projects done

Richard B writes, and asks: "Some hypothetical illustrations and hopefully they will help expand the "I do not see how that's dangerous" box several are trapped in. And why did Timmy select a re-roof of the church steeple? Why does Johnny need the 24 foot ladder? To scrape the lead paint off the light poles in the playground before he paints them of course. We want to clean gutters on the homes of the elderly in town as a fundraiser. Don't know why he fell off the semi trailer moving stacks of those boxes (it was just with a hand cart). Falling off the wagon is for an

RichardB, If this tool list ONLY applies to Eagle projects, then we'll end up with Eagle projects where ONLY adults can work them. This is supposed to be a YOUTH organization, not an organization where youth have to go recruit adults from outside the organization to work their projects. This is supposed to be youth leadership opportunities, and community service, and to exclude the youth from using SIMPLE tools on these projects is absurd. If this tool list applies to youth in all activities, then scouts doing all those hundreds of thousands of hours of community service hours

I have a question for the original poster. what does your scout book say are the requirements for eagle POR? If your scoutmaster and your book both said that the assigned by scoutmaster alternative position could count for eagle, then I say 1. your troop needs to realize that you can't use the requirements in a book that is 7+ years old. 2. you might have a leg to stand on in an appeal. if your book doesn't say that, the book you've been carrying around for 7+ years and should have read at least a couple times in there somewhere, then I think you can appeal but you probably won't wi

Sure there is something to be said for male role models, there is also something to be said for female role models. A young man at the ages of our boy scouts may not have seen women in very many other positions in life outside of mothers, teachers, nurses, service industry workers. They may have to rethink some of their gender steriotypes when they see a female adult leader hold their own in service projects physical labor, hiking long trails, camping in all manners of locations and weather (and yes, you don't have to have a blow up mattress, cot and a tent), show good scout ski

It's an interesting idea that it takes real men to raise real men. I guess there isn't enough testosterone around when women enter the picture or they can't all scratch their butts and fart orsomething? In prior centuries it was certainly mother's work to raise up fine young gentlemen, fatherly influence came about with a belt for younger lads and once old enough to start working along side dad in doing hard physical labor on the farm, but only once old enough to wear long pants and hold their own. Somehow or other women were able to raise up young men who could enter the workfo

A friend of mine and their daughter were in the original trials for the peanut treatment mentioned in that link. at first they started with microscopic particles of peanut, smaller than what you'd get as a residue on a table after eating peanut butter sandwich. They worked up very very very slowly from there, so now their daughter can eat peanut butter sandwiches but she doesnt' really like them. She has to eat something with peanuts every day in order to keep from having a reaction, which is interesting, because I also know some small kids with peanut reactions that seem to crave the peanu

Yeah those darned wolves get to use wheelbarrows but the boy scouts don't? that makes no logical sense.