BelindaB

I have two daughters (twins) in Browinies getting ready to fly up to juniors in a couple of months. My son just crossed over to Boy Scouts. Since I was his den leader I now have more time to be involved with girl scouts. (I'm going to have my husband do all parenting responsibilities with Boy Scouts). Does anyone know anything about the changes coming up in the girl scout program? We got a letter but no details yet. Makes planning hard.

I checked and Yorktown does not require the tour permit. I did turn in the tour permit with all the other required information. If council chooses to not approve it we will still be going. This is all I can do at this point. Each cub scout is accompanied by a parent. I do accept some responsibility. I have received brochures for Baloo in the mail and did not take the training. The couple of times a year it's been offered never seemed to be convenient dates. Our council is not the best organized. In my 3 years as leader we've had 5 district executives. I've made other den leaders aware that this training is needed for the future.. My son is moving up to Boy Scouts so someone else will have to deal with it. I think the troop he's going into has more fully trained leaders. Thanks again.

Thanks for all your help. At least now I don't feel so alone. We reserved our exact number of places months ago, so it might be hard to take an extra person at this point. Also it's unlikely we could find a Baloo trained person from another Pack who could go. We are several hours away from the aircraft carrier (Yorktown). If nothing else works I will try that. First, we are going to call the Yorktown and ask if a tour permit is required by them. A Scout executive told me they would ask for it, but it's not in any of the Yorktown literature we've received. Then my husband (who is very diplomatic) is going to in to the Scout office to see if they could either waive their requirement or give some special emergency training.

I am in a world of trouble. I have been den leader for 3 years mostly because no one else would do it. I have basic leader training. I took the lead in organizing a pack overnight trip to camp on an aircraft carrier. We started in September. Money is paid and around 50 people are ready to go in a month's time. Each cub scout is accompanied by a parent. Filling out the tour permit I discover that no one in our Pack has Baloo training. Our cubmaster has Woodbadge. We camp 3 times a year. I assumed he had it. Scout office says we need Baloo even though we are not going to be outside just on the ship. I am also told by Scout office that the aircraft carrier will ask for this. I have one leader who says he had the boy scout equivalent in the late 90's. I know I should have figured all this out before and that I should have done the training. But what do I do now? We will lose money and disappoint a lot of kids. My son is moving up to Boy Scouts and going to a different troop not related to this Pack. So this is my last issue.

Where do I put the Cub Scout Outdoor Activity award. Information I have says on the right pocket flap of the uniform shirt. If I sew it on there what do I do with his Summertime Activity pin. It was on the pocket flap. Also how does he button his shirt pocket with the patch over the buttonhole? Also this will make it impossible to hang the progress toward rank thing from that same button. I don't think my son will mind this since he has already made Bear but some boys might. Thanks, Mom with a Needle but no clue

The girl scout web site is selling some pieces very cheaply. I just ordered a Brownie turtleneck for $2.99 and skirts for $4.99. They do have a new style of turtleneck out but I don't think my daughters will mind and the price is great. I couldn't buy a regular turtleneck for that without the Brownie logo.

Except for the 6pm meeting time you could be describing my daughters' troop. It's a new troop also with brand new leaders. I went to the organizing meeting but did not volunteer to be an official leader because I just started as Cub Scout den leader. We were so excited to be starting Brownies. I loved Girl Scouts. My daughters wanted to be in Scouts like their big brother, but they are disappointed. The leaders hardly talk to the girls. They just put out a craft and leave them alone. This time they were supposed to be making a mobile based on the food pyramid. Most of these 1st grade girls didn't know what a food pyramid was so they were confused and missed the point. I frequently find myself taking over the meetings. The first 2 meetings they finished a half hour early and several of the girls did not have their rides there. So I made a friendship ring and sang the only Brownie song I know. Then I led some games I made up on the spot. The leaders did tell me that their Brownies are their oldest children and that they don't know a lot of games or activities. Ironicly it is the thing I feel least comfortable doing, but Cub Scout materials provides lots of ideas that I adapt. This third meeting I called the leader in advance to see how I could help. She did not seem to think they needed to do anything except the one craft. I suggested a game that went along with the theme and she seemed pleased. I also offered to take all the girls outside in the 30 minutes between school ending and the time the meeting start. Still even though the 2 of them were by themselves for 25 minutes they did not have the craft ready when we came back. I know they are not getting the support they need from the district. I am trying to be supportive and give things a chance to improve. I don't want to step on their toes since they did take on the responsiblity of being leaders. Still, I worry that one of my daughter's is so disappointed with it. She wanted to go canoeing and camping and do lots of outdoor things. So far we haven't left the school cafeteria and they don't seem to plan to in the future. We will stick with it for at least a year before asking for another troop. Mom of twin Brownies

Thanks for all your help. The friendly guy at ACE hardware helped me find some dry graphite. My son has drawn a design and we're going to try some sawing tomorrow. Again thanks so much for all the suggestions and support.

My son is a wolf and this is our first year in scouts. I just read the forum complaining about Dads helping too much and it scared me to death-- not because of the Dads helping but because I had no idea what you were talking about or how to help our son. My husband is not experienced with woodworking tools. I don't know what half the things you were talking about were. What is a "dremel". We don't own any power saws or sanders. I bought a mini hacksaw for $3 at Walmart. I looked around for a "dry lubricant" but could not find one. We were going to use leftover house paint or kid art paint. Why do you need 6 layers? Why does it have to be spray paint? Our pack is not having a workshop. Just a tryout day where you can run cars on a track before the race day. I assume we need to build our car before that. Our denmother is not good with woodworking either and they are not doing anything in den meeting. Are we going to be laughed out of the building on race day? HELP