blw2

I think this comment thing can get a little muddy. I try to keep current with the latest posts, but sometimes the latest post is a comment to a post earlier in the thread. I'm not necessarily going to scroll back up through multiple pages of posts to find the one comment that is new. Personally, I think comment works if you are commenting about the most recent post..... but if it's an old post, I think using the "quote" option is better. It puts your new post at the bottom of the thread along with the quoted post for reference. Keeps the timeline straight. I think this is a better appro

This sounds fishy to me. Why would anybody... boy or parent.... want to be in two packs? Why would the leaders want to play along? This makes absolutely no sense to me. The pack at my son's government school had their round-up last night. Our pack is chartered by our church & our church operates their own school. I must admit it crossed my mind that last night to pop into the round-up to meet the leaders and see what they are doing...... primarily to see if I could learn any good ideas, but also I suppose in the back of my mind to consider moving my son if their pack looked

I'll have to give leafsnap a try again. I tried it when it first came out, not so good. If memory serves it was limited to plants found in NY or someplace. Didn't cover a lot of the stuff here. I tried I think most all of the advancement/tracking apps that were out there maybe 1-1/2 years ago. None of them struck my fancy. I like: proknot sunrise & set Sun Seeker WeatherAlerts GoSkyWatch

Not useful, but I was thinking that a mini pack flag, on the order of 5inx7in, in a nice frame would be a nice memento. I could see hanging it in my home office. Better than a card I think.

yeah, and in the pristine north backwoods as far away as you can get, going back in time to the preindustrial age, you still had fecal contamination..... fish, birds, bear, etc..... and who knows what leaching out of all of those mineral containing rocks.

I've been trying for two years now to take BALOO, ever since I found out that our pack, like yours, is short of trained folks. Our district rarely does it, and the neighboring districts only do it during the school year when we are active with pack stuff. can't run the pack if we cancel events to get trained! Regardless, other than trying to do right why does it matter? It's family camping. Jr is camping with mom and dad, not you. The pack just happens to be there too.....

Historically our pack has taken the direction of no direction. Get the boys outside, and let them have fun. No organized anything. I like that in theory, but what happens is the boys end up running wild and playing with sticks. Some of that is good and healthy. Let's the natural leaders lead and the followers follow. Lets them figure out "life" and experience stuff they never see at home like trees and dirt. But I think we could do with maybe 1 or 2 organized games or lessons a day. Not sit down book stuff, but hikes, activities, outdoor craft lessons, etc.... maybe a clean the trai

makes me think of a scout trip as a youth. Freezing rain at night while we slept. Couldn't start a camp fire for anything. Everything was wet and frozen solid. Ate frozen dogs straight from the cooler for breakfast.

Our CC helped at our Round Up last night. He wore his troop uniform. I didn't even notice if he had his new SM patch or old ASM patch on it. Either way, it was totally appropriate me thinks.

great idea!

Yeah, no kidding. charting a week worth of anything will take a good 2-3 weeks with my son! Since our new DL has taken over, we tend to focus on coming up with activities for the den meetings.... either out of the book, electives, or belt loops.... or even just fun activities for the den meeting that aren't in the program. the boys have more fun and will want to come back to the next den meeting. Doing that boring stuff can be done at home!.... well a lot of it anyway.

Our RTC is great. She would really make a good CM, full of positive energy. She does a great job of pulling together an agenda and pulls from others in the district. I don't recall introductions for attendees every time. I haven't been but a few times..... maybe we did that once. anyway, that seems like it would eat too much time. Our RTC keeps it short and to the point. She has a nice system of checking in with a file of name tags. She can tell from that who attends and then those folks get an email copy of all of the announcements and lots of other stuff that she pulls together fo

Intuitively I agree with the advice to not waste your time on lost causes..... but I also do really want to know the real reason why somebody left. Problem is, I'll bet you will NEVER really hear the real or whole reason..... for example - if soccer is the excuse.... does that mean that soccer is more fun then scouts because the den leader wasn't on his/her game and it was boring doing craft projects, or because scouting wasn't fun because of a bully in the den, or because scouting wasn't fun because the kid truly doesn't spark with the types of activities even though the scouts were doing

this one too http://www.starbrite.com/item/mdg-mildew-odor-control-boat-bomb-6cs

Yeah, I'm not so sure that a CC really needs a uniform from my perspective anyway. It seems like a behind the scenes position. Our CM is the troop's CC, and the troop's SM is the pack's CC. I've never seen them have the need to wear uniforms for the CC positions.

I've never used this stuff, but saw it used on a boating TV show once. For small things like cushions he enclosed a small chlorine dioxide packet wit the cushion in a plastic bag. Can be hung in larger spaces like a boat cabin. Might be able to figure a way to treat a tent.... perhaps if the tent is small enough you could seal it in a garbage back loosely with one of these packets. It releases chlorine dioxide gas and it'll kill the mildew or mold, and other nasties that cause musty odors. http://www.amazon.com/Star-NosGUARD-Mildew-Control-System/dp/B004O0FP4S/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&q

I was thinking the same thing. I haven't seen a bear open a tent but can't imagine why a tent would be different than a tarp or hammock..... unless there's a theory that a tent looks more like a big boulder than a sausage.

The IF you can tie to them comment, was meant more about rules. Some places have rules against tying anything to trees.

I'm re-thinking this whole topic lately. I recently followed a discussion on another forum that I visit (camping but not scouting). Anyway, this guy just finished a rim to rim hike of the grand canyon...... something like his 4th or 5th time doing it. This time, he and his teenaged daughter did it wearing those Vibram 5-Fingers shoes. I've never tried these things, but I understand that the idea is that it makes you walk in a more natural way, using your foot and legs as God designed them. I found a you-tube video that had side by side screen shots of someone running on a treadmil

yeah, that is funny! Must have been a Freudian slip of sorts...... Trails End..... you know, the junky prizes.

On the other hand, if the goal is to teach urban navigation to boys that already know country navigation I would set the plan based solely on street names and landmarks. Then maybe assign the task to decode the directions as they travel into compass headings and distances. This is an interesting concept and could go a lot of different ways depending on purpose. One thing for sure... today's smart phones, internet nav sites, and GPS have all but destroyed paper map reading and intuitive sense of direction in an urban setting

I'm in a dual role position.... I volunteered to be ADL. Then the CM resigned so a friend that was a Committee Member volunteered to be CM. He then asked me to be ACM. I have retained the duties of ADL too, but per council you can only register in one position, so I'm registered as ACM I agree with others though, do one or the other but not both unless it's a really small pack. Are any of the parents in the Den good ones to tap? Seems like there's always one parent who's the unofficial not in uniform pseudo-ADL. Tap that person as "it" for the DL if you want to take CM.

Sounds like a volksmarch! I think it's a great idea if the boys are from suburbia or the country.