Second Verse ... Same as the First

This week will be very similar to last week. we will meet at the church at 7:00 pm for opening exercises and then migrate to the Mack's to continue work on the trebuchet. Don't forget to wear your uniforms.

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Putting Hammer to Nail

Well, there aren't going to be any nails as such, but the building begins this week. We will be meeting at the Church at 7:00pm (uniforms required) and then carpooling to the Mack's to begin building. Here is a quick peek at the goal ...

Trebuchet

The Behemoth

And so it begins ...

http://www.stormthecastle.com/trebuchet/behemoth/behemoth-trebuchet-index.htm

Please join me on Wednesday at 7:00 pm at the Church to begin our Engineering theme and create this monster.  Don't forget your uniforms.

We will try to have it complete for our last 2012 campout on October 26th (West Desert) for some live fire action with pumpkins.  This will also be the final opportunity this year for the following scouts to earn their wilderness survival badge:

Dylan Waters
Jordan Richey
Noah Miller
Tanner Oblad (invited to join the younger boys for this campout)
Hayden Hart

We will also begin planning 2013 in the near future and putting together our agenda for Parent's Night in January.  As parents or scouts, your input is always welcome ... however now is a very opportune time for it!

Oh, and for your viewing pleasure ... some shots from our last campout.

Camping Time Again

It's been a few weeks without information here.  I'm sorry about that.  This week we prepare for our overnight camp on Friday up at Strawberry Reservoir.  We'll meet at church on Wednesday at 7:00 and then at the Mack's house on Friday at 3:00pm.  We'll return by 3:00 on Saturday.

This is a fishing campout, so all scouts and adults who wish to fish will need to get a license.  Please visit the Utah Division of Wildlife for directions.

It's also shaping up to be a cooler weekend, so campers should prepare accordingly.

Wood Chopping

Time to chop some more wood up.  We've recieved another donation of wood and I noticed the unchopped pile is getting bigger than the chopped pile.  We'll meet at the church at 7pm and then head over to the Kelsch's.  Don't forget gloves, closed toe shoes, and long pants.

Friends of Service

We have a service opportunity and our usual Wednesday activity this week.

1. The service opportunity is on Tuesday at 6:00 at the Hart's house.  This is for the whole family.  We'll be digging post holes for a neighbor's fence.
2. The Wednesday activity is a follow-up to our Friends of Scouting drive last week.  We need your support on this, so please come in full uniform.  We'll meet at the Church at 7:00.

Doubling Up

We have two events again this week:

First - Tuesday @ 6:00 PM at  14267 Trailview Way.  Please come prepared to work - we'll be helping the Wheeler family move into our Ward ... so long pants, closed toe shoes, etc.  This will count towards service hours for rank advancements.  Don't forget to bring your Dad!

Second - Wednesday @ 7:00 PM at the Church.  Scouts must be in Class A uniforms for this.  Dads can come too to help drive.  We'll be going door to door in pairs for Friends of Scouting.  I believe the routes are pretty short this year.

Busy Week

UPDATED TUESDAY - SEE BOLD TEXT

We have a couple things going on this week:

1. On Tuesday at 6:30 pm we will be meeting at the Hyatt's (6367 Rodeo Way) for the annual BBQ and Swim Party combined activity.  Bring your swim suit and your appetite (no uniform necessary).  For Deacons assigned to bring chips, there are three tubes of Pringles and a bag of Ruffles left over from camp that I will be bringing.
2. On Wednesday at 6:00 pm we will be meeting at the Church for a special occasion - Ryker Kelsh's and Cameron Moon's Eagle Courts of Honor.  The Boy Scouts will be providing the color guard for it (I'll pull some boys aside on Tuesday for this) and full class A uniforms are required.  Please come and celebrate these two young men who have worked so hard to achieve the highest youth Boy Scout award.

Under the Weather

I've been ill since late Sunday and entirely delinquent in my Scoutmaster duties this week.  Hopefully the boys were able to enjoy some basketball earlier tonight as the combined activity (BBQ & Pool Party) was rescheduled from today to next Wednesday.  Unfortunately, this also overlaps with the Ryker Kelsch and Cameron Moon Eagle Court of Honor.

I'll discuss this challenge with the other advisers since the Boy Scouts (12-13) are expected to provide the flag ceremony at that Cour of Honor.  Look for an update later this week or early next.

2012 District Summer Camp Information

We are heading out to Summer Camp this week!  Please use the links throughout this post for relevant details.

Our District has a pretty exciting agenda lined up at Camp Tomahawk (driving directions).  The boys registered for Merit Badges a while back - there will likely be some adjustments to this once we've made it to camp.  We'll be mustering on Monday at 6:30am at Brother Quincy's, returning there around 3:00pm on Saturday.

Our group has been assigned to the Great Eagle site at Camp Tomahawk.  Unfortunately, the closest weather forecast I could get is for Bear River Lodge, and it looks to be wet most of the week.  Should be fun!

Papers

Medical forrm and tent tip sheet!

Spring bar Tent Care and Feeding

BSA Medical Form

Tent Care

This week we join with our 11 year old Scouts to learn the ins and outs of tent care.  It was pretty apparent when we set them up last week that we could all use some lessons here, so we'll have the older boys teach the younger boys how to set them up and take them down properly, and work together to clean them off heading in to our Summer Camp next week.  We'll meet at the church at 7:00 as usual, but we'll likely head to a leader's house to get the tents up and cleaned.

As a side note, I moved footage of the shooting experiment to my hard drive today and some of the shots are pretty fun in slow motion.  If there is anything to learn from this experience besides all the terminal ballistics stuff, its that we can really learn to improve our camera skills.  I'll see what I can do to get some video cut and put online soon.

Shooting Wrap Up

This week we will wrap up our shooting theme.  We'll look at some video from Saturday's event, listen to those that attended and spend some time learning how to disassemble and maintain modern firearms.  Please meet at the church at 7pm on Wednesday for opening exercises.  We'll then travel to the Mack's.  Please don't forget to wear your uniforms. 

Unfortunately we couldn't have our campout and ballistics demonstration last week due to the fire.  Our prayers go out to all those who've suffered as a result of the many fires in Utah, as well as the emergency workers who diligently try to bring them under control.

I was able to get permission to continue with the ballistics demonstration this Saturday up at the Lee Kay Shooting Range, which is a very safe and controlled environment.  We are also scheduled to have a West Valley detective on hand with a few additional firearms not previously expected.  It should be great.

Let's meet at the Mack's at 12:30 on Saturday to head up.  We'll be gone until around 5:00 pm at the latest, but will likely be home earlier.  Please bring eye and ear protection if you have it, and a hat.  Also, please eat before you come and bring some water with you.  There isn't much shade in the shooting bays we are using.

Driving Directions to Lee Kay

Weekend Weather Forecast

Quick Change

Here is a map to our destination. If you print directions they will be a little dodgy, but the picture is worth a thousand words.
View Larger Map

A quick change from the calendar.  It looks like we need to rearrange some things for Independance Day.  Rather than having Scouts on Wednesday this week, we'll have our combined activity on Thursday.  Please assemble at the church at 6:30pm.  We will caravan to the Riverton church offices to do family history work.

Neither James nor myself will be able to make it.

Friday is our campout.  We'll head out a little later this time.  Please eat an early dinner and join us at 5:00 pm at the Mack's, where we will depart for Blackrock Canyon (12 miles south of 5 mile pass).  This is our wilderness survival camp, which means no tents - just bring your normal gear and we'll build our own shelters.  We'll also have a bit of a ballistics science project / demonstration to continue with the Shooting theme.  It should be fun!

We'll return Saturday before lunch.

Guns and Ammo

Don't forget your homework from last week!

This week we will continue our Shooting theme in preparation for the ballistics experiment and campout.  We'll meet at the church at 7:00 pm as usual, then caravan to the Mack's for more discussions and hands-on time with firearms and ammunition.

Our overnight campout this month is on June 29th.  We'll be heading to the West Desert for some wilderness survival skill training and our ballistics demonstration (various types of ammunition vs. ballistic gel).  No scouts will be firing guns at this event, but it should be pretty exciting.  More details to come.

Here is the link to your rifle merit badge homework!
Rifle Shooting Homework

Young Guns

This week marks the beginning of our Shooting program.  We'll focus on safety and fun, and sprinkle in a few requirements from the Rifle Shooting merit badge.  This week we'll be meeting at the Church at 7:00 pm for opening exercises.  We'll then drive to the Mack's (6044 W Intrigue Dr) for some hands-on discussions.  For safety reasons, ammunition and firearms will not be presented at the same time.  It should be fun!

Stake Conference

No scouts this week, we have the Youth Session of Stake Conference.  Please wear your Sunday dress - we will be meeting at the Stake Center at 7:00 pm.

Power Tools and Goblin Valley

We are going to get our hands on some fun power tools this Wednesday to chop the wood we gathered last year for our campouts.  We will meet at the church at 7:00 pm as usual.  No uniforms are necessary.  However, since we will be working with wood and power tools, please bring the following:

• Long pants
• Closed toe shoes
• Work gloves
• Eye protection
• Water bottle

If you have any of the following, we could use those too:

• Sledge hammers
• Splitting wedges or spikes

On an unrelated note, we all made it back from Goblin Valley without incident.  I've included a few pictures below.  Sawyer volunteered to put a slide show together in the near future;  when that is done I'll post it also.

A few fun facts:
Distance traveled (on foot): 15 miles (12 in one day)
Elevation change (on foot): 1 mile
Wind speeds: ridiculous
Goblin Valley is poorly named, it should be called Nature's Sandblaster
Worn out campers: 4 adults; 5 boys (Harrison Redford probably had another 12 miles in him)

Welcome Back!

QUICK UPDATE 5/22/12 7:00pm - High winds expected for the duration of the stay.  Don't forget your hats and bring a bandanna if you have one.

QUICK UPDATE 5/22/12 6:00pm - Attendees need to bring their own lunch for the first day. Youth will need a signed permission slip if their parent is not attending. Please use the form to the right in the "useful links" section.

We have a camp coming up on Thursday this week.  It's our annual Goblin Valley and Little Wildhorse outing.  It is a two night camp and will require attendees to miss school / work for two days (Thursday / Friday).  The scouts will learn some outdoor survival skills, enjoy an amazing slot canyon hike, and spend hours wandering the hoodoos in the Valley of the Goblins.  Here is a short slideshow from last year's trip.


Camp Details:
Leaving Thursday May 24th at 9:00am
Returning Saturday May 26th before 5:00pm
Depart from and return to Mack's
Weather Forecast
Driving Directions

I've also uploaded a short video from our Fifth Water Hot Springs overnight camp and hike from last month.  Enjoy!