Blue and Gold Fiesta

Our Blue and Gold Banquet really came together thanks to our hardworking, creative, and awesome leaders and parents.  I want to document some of the ways that they made the event spectacular.

Luckily most of our parents have email so one of the leaders sent an Evite so we would have a good idea how many people would be coming.  The supper was a taco bar, and the same fabulous leader created a Signup Genius for the food.  The amount of food and drink was just about perfect so I included the signup list below.  She also made a backdrop and gathered props for a fun photo booth.

Another leader made a pile of pinatas with each scout's awards bagged inside.  You are supposed to be able to pull the ribbon at the bottom and the cones separate but it was tricky getting enough glue to hold them together and still be able to easily separate.  The scouts had fun pulling them apart anyway. The instructions and inspiration came from here.

Our award pinatas

The pinata maker also ran the camp table (which was right near the entrance--gotcha!) to get families to sign their scouts up for summer camp.  We had the scouts' camp account balances on hand plus flyers with the dates and camp costs, and registration forms.  Another leader brought a computer with a Powerpoint that he had made to promote summer camp.  Several boys signed up so we are off to a great start!  

These nifty sombreros were also made by the pinata maker, and were inspired by this site.

Paper and pom-pom sombrero

I made the spectacular cake awards and some decorations.  These papel picado banners were inspired by the same site as the sombreros, Frog Prince Paperie.

Blue and gold papel picado

I found this cactus online and was tickled.  I love cacti, and this one is made from a cuke and some toothpicks.  The original instructions use sand and a painted styrofoam bowl but I used pea gravel from the local plant nursery and some pots that I had sitting around.  The cucumbers I bought were called Thai cucumbers.  I used leftover play dough from a previous post to hold the cucumber in place and keep the gravel from falling through the drainage hole in the bottom of the pot.

Cute cuke cactus

The cactus, papel picado,  and sombreros could have been done by the boys if we had planned the projects more than a couple days (or less!) ahead.  The cucumbers were really juicy so couldn't be done ahead of time, I am sure they would have been gross in a day or two.  The papel picado could be cut ahead of time but I attached them to the string when I got to the banquet site since I wasn't sure how long I wanted them to be and was also worried they would get tangled.  They go together pretty quickly.

I should also mention that leaders and volunteers manned the activity stations and the kitchen.  Three adults spent almost the whole time setting up the food line, heating tortillas and shells, helping serve food, and doing dishes.  They worked very hard and made dinner go smoothly.

OK now for some boring stuff that may come in handy next year so I am going to include it.

Order of events:

Cubmaster gave a brief history of scouting (why we celebrate Blue and Gold).

Webelos led everyone in the Pledge of Allegiance and Cub Scout Promise.

Bears did a scout prayer.

Tables were dismissed by row to get food.

After everyone had food the Friends of Scouting presenter spoke.

After the boys had eaten they were free to go to stations that had been set up: leatherworking (stamp a bracelet or keychain), photo booth, bean game (this was a relay with dried beans carried in spoons).

After a bit the scouts were given ballots to vote for their favorite dessert, then the Friends of Scouting rep assigned the remaining awards to other desserts.

Cake awards were announced and dessert was eaten.

Rank and other awards were presented via the pinatas.  Scouts remained on the stage until all awards were received, then were lined up along with leaders for group photos.

Cleanup!

Below is the food signup list which was about right for around 75 people.  Dessert was provided by the scouts who entered the dessert contest.

2 lbs of Taco Meat Cooked (6) if available please bring in crock pot

Shredded Chicken (2)

Refried Beans (2) Please Prepare @ 3 cans   

Spanish Rice (2)   

Chopped Lettuce (2)   

Chopped Tomatoes    

Large Jar of Salsa (3)   

Black Olives (2)    

Jalapenos (2)    

Shredded Taco Cheese Large Bag (5)   

Taco Shells package of 12 (10)    

Tortillas (soft taco size) (5)    

Chips-Tortilla (4)   

Queso Cheese Dip warm (2)   

Chopped Onion    

Sour Cream (2)    

Guacamole (2)    

2 liter Sprite (3)   

2 liter Coke (3)    

2 liter Lemonade (3)   

Large Bag of Ice (2)    

Ice Tea (2)    

Spoon!

Cake Awards

Our pack tradition is to have a cake contest at Blue and Gold.  This year we are doing a fiesta theme and are accepting any desserts.  Our impartial judge last year was our Friends of Scouting presenter.  That worked pretty well, but this year we are also doing a scout's choice.

A pin on Pinterest inspired me to wood burn spoons for awards last year and hence inspired the derby awards (see previous post).  In fact the wood shield plaques are nearly sold out so we are switching to a different plaque this year (can I get a commission?).

The wooden spoons are from a craft store.   You could sand and stain them but I used them as is.

Dough!

Webelos sculpt with homemade play dough.

I now have a Webelos den.  Last week we started on the artist activity badge by playing with play dough.  My son absolutely loved play dough when he was little; I made it using a recipe that I will share.

I made 3 batches of the recipe (one red, one blue, one yellow) for our den meeting.  We discussed primary colors and mixed bits of the dough to make secondary colors.  The green came out great, the orange was OK and the purple was not very good.  Maybe the red was too dark?  Then the boys made their clay sculptures using the dough and photographed them.

While they were sculpting we talked about different mediums and types of art (don't forget comics, video games, and other fun things are created by artists!), and our favorite artists.  We had also planned a show and tell; the boys were to bring something made by or designed by an artist.  Two families remembered (we were not one of them ^_^; ).  This was a fun way to get the boys to participate and contribute.

The dough was such a huge hit we did not have time for drawing but I'm not complaining.  Volcanos ended up being the most popular subject.  Perhaps we should work on geologist next? Everyone took their dough home in a baggie, even my son who originally thought the activity was beneath him.  There is just something about kneading the soft dough (especially when it is still warm from cooking it) that is very pleasant and soothing.

Here is the recipe.

Play Dough

1 cup flour

1 cup water

1/2 cup salt

1 Tbsp cooking oil

2 tsp cream of tartar

Food coloring

In a medium saucepan, combine all the ingredients except for the food coloring.  Stir well with a spoon.

Cook over medium heat.  Add a few drops of food coloring.  Stir until mixture starts to form a ball.  Remove from heat and allow to cool a bit.

Knead the dough until it is soft and smooth.  It will keep for a very long time in an airtight container at room temperature.

Try to keep it from being trampled into the carpet!

One of several volcano sculptures.

PWD!

It is that special time of year again, pinewood derby time.  Not my favorite event, but who can argue with tradition?  Last year I sort of helped with the trophies.  They were based on the ones you have probably seen online, a wedge shaped block (ours were more of a rectangular block stood on end with a slanted top) with a toy race car spray painted gold on top.  The name of the award and the year were typed and printed and decpoupaged on.  They looked great but required a lot of sawing and sanding.

This year I did tons of internet research (read procrastinating cleaning the house) hoping to find something slightly easier that would also appeal to the boys.  I found these snazzy 5x7" shield plaques at JoAnn Fabric.  I woodburned the writing and another leader painted the cars left over from last year.  I stained them with some Ipswich pine Minwax I had on hand, and added sawtooth picture hangers on the back, and an adhesive bumper at the bottom of each on back. Oh, and they also needed some sanding first to smooth them out.

There are six total: 1st, 2nd, and 3rd fastest which will be based on the race results, and 1st, 2nd, and 3rd best design based on scouts' votes.

My son really wanted to male a creeper car.  I told him it would not be the fastest and probably wouldn't even get best design, but at least he would have a cool looking car that he would like. He was OK with that.

Bear Den Meeting: Building Muscles/What's Cooking

Sorry there is no original image for this entry, though clip art does look better than my photos.  What I have to write is not even geeky (OK maybe it is, who am I to judge?) but it is probably my most important discovery as a scout leader.

When determining what achievements we would cover this year I thought my den would like the two-person contests (which are sort of like wrestling) from Bear achievement 16.  You are supposed to do six of them and I labeled the ones that I thought would be safest and crossed out the ones where I thought it could get too violent (a foot in the face, someone thrown to the floor...just look at the handbook and imagine the WPO).

For whatever reason I decided to do Requirement 9g: cook something outdoors on the same night.  Fire and wrestling--what could go wrong?

Despite my worries this turned out to be a very successful meeting.  This sounds kind of drastic but I determined that the boys will get more out of it if there is some risk involved.  They are going to have more fun, try harder, and even be more careful if there is the possibility of injury, mess, or damage. 

In contrast, last year as a new den leader with 5 Wolves I thought we would have a nice meeting about the American flag.  I did a bunch of research and had a lot of interesting facts to share about our flag which I won't include here because that meeting had more injuries and tears than any other!  The boys were so bored and restless that their behavior was abominable.   It made me change my den meeting structure for the rest of the year (which will hopefully be in a future post) and caused me to fear doing the one on one tests of strength a year later.

Naturally you need to stay within the safe scouting guidelines! However sometimes there is an activity that is recommended for the age group you are leading but you are worried it might still be too risky.  In that case maybe you should try it anyway.  Your scouts might thank you.  Someday.

Wolf Elective 1: It's a secret!

After my den earned their Wolf rank last year we had a meeting where we did elective 1 which  involves invisible ink and secret codes.

I made code books for the boys, though they were not as big a hit as I thought they would be.  One scout in particular was not comfortable with writing a message in code.  Luckily I had also brought a telegraph key (for sending morse code) which had more hands-on appeal, and that went over a bit better with him.

The code books include the pigpen cipher, morse code, pig latin, turkish irish, braille, and a cryptograph wheel.  Most of these can be found in multiple places on the web but I included sources I used for further reference.  Pig latin was by far the most popular of these and I now hear it nearly every day from my son, so be forewarned!  Click here to download a copy of the code book.

For the invisible ink bit I used an electric sandwich maker to reveal the ink.  The Wolf Handbook says to use a light bulb but bulbs do not give off heat like they used to.  I just stuck the page with the lemon juice writing in my heated sandwich press, closed it, and checked it in a couple minutes.  Most of the invisible messages were revealed quite nicely with this method.

After the codes we flipped through the back of the Wolf book and did some of the quicker electives, like measure your hand using inches and centimeters, and say "hello" in another language.  As we looked through the book I asked my scouts what electives they would be interested in doing in our future meetings.  Two that they chose which we spent the most time on were "Let's Have a Party" and "Be an Actor."  They also chose to visit a library, which surprised me for some reason.  I am so glad I asked for their input because we had a blast with the electives they chose and the library meeting was definitely my best den meeting ever at that time.

Bike safety battle mat

Bike Safety Battle Mat

Here is our Crystal Caste mat serving as a hands on bike safety display for our bike rodeo pack meeting.  Much better than the poster that I was originally thinking of making.  I made it by drawing a neighborhood on the mat with Vis a Vis markers, then getting my husband to make the figures.  The images we used are from other sites so I didn't feel comfortable including a template for them here.  He photoshopped them to have a mirror image at the base so you could fold them in half and have the image on both sides.  The images were printed on card stock.  I glued the sides together, trimmed off the excess paper, and stuck the figures in plastic bases.  Our meeting was outside so I used sticky tack to hold the pieces to the board.  They could still be easily rearranged to create various scenarios for discussing bike and pedestrian safety.  All the scouts from Tigers to Webelos seemed to enjoy it.

The ducks are crossing...what would you do?