tdk101

We have been going to our district day camp for 6 years. About 3 weeks before camp there is a training for all adult volunteers where they do Youth Protection training, safe swim, etc. They go over what the responsiblities of the den leader will be. They go over buddy system and schedules. We do have a theme each year. Our day camp is from 8:30 to 5:30 Monday through Friday. On Monday, every camper must go through the registration line to make sure that all paperwork is complete and medical forms are complete. You are told which den number you are with. It goes pretty quick if all paperwork is turned in. Each camper must have a pick up form filled out saying who is picking up the camper each day. You go to your den table and get a t-shirt, cup, and totem. Everything is labeled with a name and den number. There are nametags for everyone for the first day. A camper must be signed in each morning by whoever brought them and also signed out each night with whoever is picking up. This is done with the den leaders. On Monday afternoon, we get a list of who is picking up each day. Each camper and adult for the week MUST wear the camp t-shirt or they have to wear a special wrist band so we know who is supposed to be there. We get a pallet under a dining canopy so the kids have somewhere to store their gear when they don't need it. A couple of port a potty's are rented for the week so that the plumbing isn't taxed too much. There is 1 bathroom for men and 1 for women and the adults get to use those. There are also a few latrines in some of the program areas. We use a scout reservation for our camp so we do a lot of walking around. Siblings are allowed to attend but they must be with their parents. Our day camp cost $155 for the week if a parent does not attend at all. If a parent can attend for at least 1 day, the cost is $105. If you are on staff for the week, it is $55. They charge $5 per day for the tag-a-longs or $20 for the whole week to cover supplies. The tags do everything that the cubs do but they don't earn belt loops and such. We have 8 periods that are 45 minutes long and 10 minutes in between to get to the stations. We have archery, fishing, sports, swimming, crafts, scout skills, nature and den time. They are always in that order but you rotate periods each day. Water jugs are at each station and boys are asked to drink at each area. Lunch and break are from 11:45 to 12:45 each day. Each camper brings their own lunch and we all eat in the dining hall together. Bug juice and coffee is provided each day. Each den is given a snack for the afternoon. Pretzels or cookies. They get a colored a bead at each station for their totems and they can earn special beads by doing the bobcat requirements with certain people in the camp. During den time we work on a skit for the Friday night family picnic and award campfire. We also work on coming up with a den name and den cheer. It is an awesome experience. Each year it is like a family reunion - most of the same staff return and they remember the kids and the adults. They really make it fun for the kids. When we first went with our son there were like 2-3 kids from our pack. Before that none attended. Now our pack routinely has 10 or more kids. My son's den had 10 boys in it and 6 were from our pack. Distance prevents some of the other boys from attending. It takes about 45 minutes to get there. We do carpool as much as possible.

When my older son's den was moving on to Boy Scouts, the boys and their families gave us a gift certificate to a local restaurant but the best gift was a plaque that had 5 group pictures on it - 1 from each year the kids were in Cub Scouts. That is proudly displayed in our living room.

Mom : someone created a pattern. The only sewing was at the shoulders. They were able to cut it out in one piece. I don't know if they just made a pattern or used the actual vest to create the pattern. I know they got red felt cheap at Walmart or JoAnn Fabrics. Hope that helps.

The boys in our den did not want to wear the patch vest so we took a binder and got the whole sheet plastic page protectors and slid colored cardstock in each protector. The boys then took velcro and attached it to the patch and then stuck it in their binder on any page they wanted to. They took markers and could write a little something about how they got the patch or when they got it. The velcor allowed them to take it out of the book and wear it on the uniform as many patches have the little button loop. Then they could change the patches as often as they wanted to. We got the binders where they could slide a piece of paper in the front to make a cover - they were able to decorate it however they wanted to. The kids liked this because they could show their binder off. They also had information about where and when and how they got the patch. The only problem - we do a lot of stuff so they have a lot of patches - the binder quickly filled up and they had to move to a bigger binder. Other dens made the vests - so much cheaper than buying it at the scout store.

Our PWD has Cub Scout divisions for each rank level and then the winners from each rank go for the Pack Cup. We also have a sibling division for any sibling in grades 5 and under, a Girl Scout division and then an 6th grade & up division. All divisions follow the same rules. It has worked very well for us. We charge the non-Cub Scouts $5 for the kit and then a $2 entry fee to help cover the cost of trophies or medals and patches. The families love it because everyone gets to participate in the fun. After the official racing, the track is open for free racing and you see families lining their cars up to race each other. We do use Boy Scouts to put the cars on the track but we have leaders that volunteer to be judges - we have 2 judges. If there is a question as to which car won, we run the race again. If the leaders child is racing, there is someone that steps in to officiate that particular race. Hope that helps.

In my son's Wolf den, we got Home Depot or Lowes to donate a bunch of wooden kits they had left over and the boys built it. Then they wrapped it with newspaper (recycle) and tied it with a knot (another requirement but don't know which one) and then gave it as a gift to whomever they wanted.(This message has been edited by tdk101)

Eliza - they are not using glue this year. You just wrap the bands tightly and then as a new color is added it continues along the way until she is done with that color. When she is done with the color, she cuts it off a little longer so the next color will wind around it. The nameplates were printed on cardstock and had a hole punched in it. Then it was attached to the rawhide. Some of the arrows will take several hours of work but the kids were very excited to have them. The parents seemed to appreciate it as well.

I tied each color off in knots and used a dot of glue. This years are being done by continuing the strand and then winding the next color over it. There are only 2 knots - 1 at the beginning and 1 at the end. This method uses a little more thread but the end result is much neater. We did Tiger(orange), Wolf(red), Gold arrow (gold), silver arrow (silver - however many they earned), religious emblem (purple - if they earned one), Bear (aqua), Gold arrow (gold), silver arrow (silver - however many they earned), Webelos (navy blue), Webelos activity pins (grey - one for each one), religious emblem (purple - if they earned one), arrow of light ( royal blue, yellow, royal blue). White bands were put between each rank and black bands separated each arrow or webelos pin. I hope that makes sense. They were personal for each boy. Use a piece of tape to label each arrow. We ordered arrow that had blue & gold fletchings. We used rawhide string so the boys could hang them. My wife made nameplates with her scrapbooking tools and we included a color key so the boys would know what each color meant.

We made them for our boys last year - first time ever our Pack has done this. We used the colored threads that are used for cross-stitch and made bands for each rank that the boy earned. We had seen some that were painted but that was not working out as well. They were time consuming but came out awesome and the boys loved them. I am happy to see that the Pack is continuing the tradition this year as well. Also all of our boys did not earn the AOL at B&G. The ones that were done and wanted to move on did and the rest finished at the end of the school year. Some went to Boy Scouts and some wanted to do sports instead.

My sons Wolf den grew to 18. We got two ADL for the den and each week they split into 3 groups - the groups change weekly. The boys then rotate through the 3 leaders. It works for most activities. They are still one den but get into smaller groups for activities. May not be the perfect solution but it seems to work for us. We realize that down the road, the boys may need to be split into 2 dens. For whatever reason, this den saw a ton of new recruits (9 new scouts) this year. We have an awesome leader. The 2 dads that stepped up to be ADL had boys that were active last year. We are working on getting some of the new parents to help out too.

We broke tradition last year and had some scouts earn AOL and crossover at B&G in February. Our pack had always done it in May prior to that. There were some scouts that wanted to wait until May. All the boys in the den - including those that crossed over - were allowed to participate in all Cub events until the end of the year as a den. Our Pinewood Derby was in March and we also had a Space Derby in May. They were all kept in the loop with e-mails from the Pack and could participate in any of the events. We kept them on our e-mail list through the summer. We have a camping trip to an island that many of them still wanted to go on.

We do them as desert for our Blue & Gold. Everyone present gets to vote on different categories and then we all dig in and enjoy! We gave out the golden wisk for the top voted cake. A wisk from the dollar store spray painted gold. Kids loved it.(This message has been edited by tdk101)

We use scoutlander. It is free and meets our needs. It can be a little slow at times. Out troop is now using it too. We like that there is a public part of our site and also a private part to the site that only members can view. It has been a very valuable tool for us.

This may not be by the book but this is how our Pack handles camping: The Council camp we use for our fall campout has 3 single room cabins. In the 6 years I have been involved in scouts, we have always taken all three buildings so none of them are filled to capacity. This also lets the boys graduate from the big cabin (usually tiger and wolf) cabins (although everyone is welcome in any of the cabins) to the other cabins. Funny how it works that way and it has been my experience the newer scouts like the main cabin because that's where we serve the meals and the experienced parents like the smaller cabins. The kids (scouts and siblings) sleep in loft areas on mattress pads and the adults sleep in army style cots beneath the loft. There's enough room for the adults to spread out the cots to give any co-ed leaders parents a little space. Its explained to everyone that cabins are communal living and usually we post someone at the latrines to ensure privacy when a female is using the "facilities". We go out our way to educate everyone what to expect and are willing to stress that if someone has some concerns to approach a leader and let us know so we can try to develop a workable solution to make everyone happy. I know this may not comply with BSA policies to the letter but we have never had a complaint and out fall camp out is definately a highlight of our program.

I am the new Cubmaster for an active pack and am looking to incorporate some new outdoor activies to our Scouting year. One of the activies is I was considering was Geocaching. I don't have any experience geocaching but it seemed like it might be an activity the boys might enjoy. Since I have not tried geocaching yet (its on my to-do list)my questions are: Has anyone done it at a cub level? Is locating one cache enough or would you need to plan for multiple caches? Would one GPS unit be sufficient or would it be better to break the boys up into small groups? Thanks for your input.