Adam found Ethan’s scout hat lying around and decided to try it on for size. 🙂
Month: January 2014
Ethan’s Conservation Project
To earn the cub scout World Conservation award, Ethan had everything completed except participating in a den or pack conservation project. Well his den and the pack haven’t ever planned a conservation project so it’s not like we just never participated. We have actually worked on this award while he was a wolf and a bear too, but never actually got it finished before his birthday, and as the requirements change with each rank, that meant starting all over again each time. With his eleventh birthday coming up in just a couple of days we didn’t want to get this close to finishing the award and not finish it yet again, so we discussed possible conservation projects, and let Ethan decide which one he would like to go ahead with. He decided on making bird feeders to feed the birds that stick around for the winter. Next we explored the different options for bird feeders that we could make and we decided on one that uses gelatin to make the bird seed stick together and you press it into a cookie cutter to make it into cool shapes to hang from the trees. Then we invited all the cubs in the pack to come over to our house to make some. We had about 5 boys show up, plus Ethan and Jeremy which makes about 7 from our pack. Then we invited cousins Lars and Daniel to come participate as well since they are also scouts. I mixed up the bird seed with the softened gelatin and we explained to the boys what we were doing, what the award was and how to make the bird feeders that we were making. Then I had Ethan pass out the seed.
I’m excited to finally have the requirements for this award finished, and I’m so glad that several boys from the pack came to participate. I was starting to fear that nobody was going to show. 😉
Time with Cousins
I mentioned in my last post that Tyra and Jeremy weren’t home because they were having a sleepover at cousins, so we had to work out some way of collecting them this morning. Being the first Saturday of the month we decided to meet cousins at the Home Depot kids workshop.
The kids got to build block calendars, a fitting project for January. We also saw and got to chat a bit with Kyle’s cousin Tori and her family.
When the kids were finished with their projects, we invited Lars, and Daniel out to our house to participate in Ethan’s conservation project, and so they came home with us.
The kids pretty much spent the day goofing around, making forts out of the new set up in the girls room.
Later in the afternoon we rearranged the furniture in the living room to create a circle as close to 10 feet in diameter around as possible, so we could work on the marbles pin for Ethan, and the belt loop for Jeremy. And hey Lars and Daniel are cub scouts too so we figured we might as well do something they could get credit for as well!
Kyle ordered pizza for dinner and Laurel and Roine picked it up on their way out to our house. They brought Alex and Sylvia with them and after finishing up the game of marbles we finished the evening up eating lots of pizza with all the cousins.
Atoms and Molecules and other Scout Projects
As Ethan gets closer to his eleventh birthday we have been trying to finish up the many scouting awards that he has started. Here’s just a little bit of what he’s been working on.
One of the requirements for the Science pin for cub scouts is to “build models of two atoms and two molecules, using plastic foam balls or other objects” (#6), and I thought that sounded like fun. Only I didn’t want to make them out of plastic foam balls or anything else like that, for the simple reason of: what do you do with them when you are done??? I didn’t want them to just become more clutter in the house. So I came up with the brilliant idea of making the models out of candy! Then the kids can just eat them when we’re done. 🙂
So I asked Kyle to stop off at the store on his way home to get the supplies. We used:
- Gum drops for atoms + toothpicks to make molecules
- Gum drops in the center of the atoms for the protons and neutrons (nucleus).
- Pull apart twizzlers for the rings
- Gummy life savers for the electrons
We pulled up a chart of the Periodic Table of the Elements, and Kyle explained how atoms combine together to make molecules, and he explained to Ethan how to make models of the atoms. Then Ethan picked a few simple ones to construct.
The other kids that were home got in on the fun too (really they were just happy to play with candy).
Tyra and Jeremy weren’t home, since they were having a sleepover at cousins house. So they missed out on the candy fun, but I’m sure they were having fun of their own.
Tonight he also worked on the eighth requirement for the geology pin: Make a crystal garden. I bought a kit for this, since I wasn’t sure how to do it without a kit.
So he got that all set up with Kyle’s help, and I took pictures of it periodically as the crystals grew.
It looked pretty cool with the light from Ethan’s terrarium on it too:
Here’s a shot of it the next day after he added the second set of crystal starters:
Being winter, and considering everything is frozen outside, I decided to get a terrarium kit so Ethan could complete the third requirement for the science pin: Plant seeds. Grow a flower, garden vegetable, or other plant. He actually started this one a few weeks ago, but I decided to take pictures of him with it tonight.
I love that the leaves have red on them. I think that is so cool.
New Bunk Bed for the Girls
We decided that it is time we got a second bunk bed for the girls. We have four girls and we had only one bunk bed. Tyra slept on the top, Chloe and Lydia shared the bottom and Dinah slept on a toddler mattress that got pushed under the bed during the day.
Adam really loved hanging around while Kyle and I were putting it together. He just thought it was the coolest thing.
Now all four girls have their OWN beds. 🙂
