Cubmaster Minute

You may have heard the saying, “You can’t rush art.” This refers to the fact that great art takes time. Few realize that artists rarely ‘get it right’ on the first try. Before an art work is finished, it has usually gone through multiple drafts and revisions that viewers never get to see. Such work takes not just perseverance, but faith. Keeping their mind’s eye on what their art piece will eventually become, artists are often driven by that positive perseverance to complete their work. In your own life, you will face tasks that seem too big or too time-consuming. But if you keep a positive attitude to persevere and have faith, you will succeed in all that you attempt.

Meeting Time Changes

Just a reminder to all members of Pack 195 that because Christmas Eve falls on our regularly scheduled Pack meeting this month everything is moved up one week.

That means that our Pack Meeting will be on Thursday, December 17 @ 7:00 PM and our Monthly Committee Meeting will be held on Thursday, December 10 @ 7:00 PM.

Monthly Theme: Works of Art

December is a time of celebration and giving. Involve friends in doing good deeds and creating holiday magic through art. Cub Scouts can create holiday decorations, gifts, and cards. Put their artwork on display in nursing homes, churches, schools or homes, the pack meeting room or the chartered organization. As a Good Turn for America, make cards and ornaments to share with a local retirement community, children's hospital or community center. Boys can discover different forms of art, write poems, attend a musical or performance-art show, or visit a museum. Works of Art can become gifts for family members. In conjunction with these projects we will also earn the Art belt loop.

Some of the purposes of Cub Scouting developed through this month’s theme are:

Respectful Relationships. As Cub Scouts discover their own talents, they will gain more respect for the different talents of those around them.
Spiritual Growth. Cub Scouts will develop an appreciation for Gods works of art and learn that their talents are to be treasured.
Friendly Service. Cub Scouts will make the lives of others more cheerful when they create art pieces to share and give.
Family Understanding. Cub Scouts and families will enjoy working together to create works of art and share them with others.

The core value highlighted this month are:

Faith. Through creating artwork related to the holidays, Cub Scouts will gain more understanding of their own religious traditions.
Positive Attitude. Boys will have good attitudes as they express their talents in positive ways, earn recognition, and see the effect they have on others.

Cubmaster Minute

Cub Scout families, I salute you. I salute you for your belief in the Cub Scout and Boy Scout Program and how it instills values in our youth. I salute you for your dedication to your son and your family. I salute you for all that you are doing to help our pack deliver the Cub Scout program of fun and activities to your family and to others.

Cub Scouts, I salute you. I salute you for all the hard work you do in school. I salute you for the part you play in your family. I salute you for always doing your best.

Monthly Theme: Cub Scout Salute / Heroes

This month Cub Scouts Salute the heroes who help keep us safe. Can only adults be heroes? No. Heroes are often ordinary kids who do somethign out of the ordinary. A den can decide what makes a hero and who the heroes of tomorrow might be by looking at people the boys know today. Learn about heroes in your community. Learn about those who have earned the BSA Heroism Awards. HAve your Cub Scouts invite their hometown heroes to a den or pack meeting. Your den can become "Silent Heroes" by performing service for others without seeking recognition. Visit a fire station, veterans' hospital, or police station and give a "Cub Scout Salute" for their heroism. Work on a Good Turn for America and the Citizenship belt loop and pin.


Some of the purposes of Cub Scouting developed through this month's theme include:
Good Citizenship. Cub Scouts see firsthand what it means to be a good citizen as they evaluate who their heroes are.
Friendly Service. Boys will have opportunites to express their gratitude to the people around us who happily serve us every day.

This theme is designed to promote character development by emphasizing these core values:
Respect. Cub Scouts will respoect their hereos when they see them make good choices.
Responsibility. Heroes and Cub Scouts have a responisbility to be good examples.

Cubmaster Minute

Some years ago a hard-nosed coach said, "Winning isn't everything, but it sure beats whatever's second. " There's some truth in that. Everyone likes to win. Very few people enjoy losing. The trouble is that in every type of competition, there must be losers as well as winners. It's also true in life. You and every other human being find that sometimes you have to be a loser. Perhaps your sports team loses a game on an unlucky break. Or maybe you work hard in school but get low grades. Some people might say you're a loser. Maybe so. But you don't have to stay a loser. The real difference between winners and losers is that a loss makes some people more determined to do better next time. In the long run they are the winners because they learn to profit by their defeats and mistakes. No, winning isn't everything. We can learn from losses, too.

Monthly Theme: Jungle Safari

Help boys discover fun and adventure in the wilds of Scouting. Take them on a month-long safari. Learn why Africa was special to our founder, Lord Baden-powell. Find out how The Jungle Book connects to scouting; use the story and its characters to inspire den meetin games, crafts and costumes for the pack meeting. Learn about the things you need if you're going on a safari and how you would survive. What do Scouts in Africa and india do? What are their uniforms like? Take a trip to a local zoo, animal rescue facility or wildlife refuge. Work on the Cub Scout Outdoor Activity Award or Wildlife Consevation belt loop and pin.

Some of the purposes of Cub Scouting developed through this month’s theme are:

Preparation for Boy Scouting. Outdoor activities for Cub Scouts help prepare them for the outdoor activities of Boy Scouting.
Spiritual Growth. Cub Scouts are encouraged to explore their spiritual beliefs as they continue advancing up the Cub Scout trail.

The core value highlighted this month is:
Resourcefulness. Boys learn to be resourceful as they learn how they would survive in the wild.
Cooperation. Great tasks require cooperation. Boys will learn to cooperate as they get to know living things.

Pow Wow - Cub Leaders Training

WANTED

Untrained and Undertrained Cub Scout Leaders

Description: These notorious individuals vary in height and weight, and sometimes wear olive pants and tan shirts with blue tabs on their shoulders. During the day they pose as wives or husbands, mothers or fathers and may have sons in Cub Scouting. Once a week they gather in basements, schools, churches, or other meeting places with youth dressed in blue uniforms. Also, they have an interest in character development, citizenship training, physical fitness and fun for America's Boys.

An all day round-up for these notorious adults is planed for the Annandale High School, in Annandale, Virginia on November 21, 2009.

Contact the NCAC Sheriff at powwow@gmail.com.

Cubmaster Minute

A campfire is a remarkable thing. It can be bright enough to light the path back to our tent, and it can be small enough to just barely see. Why is this? It’s because of the fuel that we put into the fire – the logs, the kindling, and the oxygen. Sometimes we Cubs are like the campfire. How strong we are is dependent upon the fuel we receive from our leaders and our parents. The better the fuel, the stronger our personal “campfire’ will be. I encourage you to always challenge your den leaders and your parents to give you the best fuel, or the best program, they can give you.

"Don’t Fight Your Pack"

An excerpt from: “The Book of Camp-Lore and Wood Craft” originally written by Dan Beard in 1920.

When we speak of ‘fighting the pack’, we mean fighting the load; that does not mean getting one’s load up against a tree and punching it with one’s fists or ‘kicking the stuffings out of it’, but it means complaining and fretting because the load is uncomfortable.…the mind has as much to do with carrying the load as the muscles. If the mind gives up you will fall helpless under a small load; if the mind is strong you will stagger along under a very heavy one.

When I asked a friend, who bears the scars of the pack straps on his body, how he managed to endure the torture of such a load, he replied with a grin that as soon as he found that to ‘fight his pack’ meant to perish – meant death!-he made up his mind to forget the blamed thing and so when the pack wearied him and the straps rubbed the skin off his body, he forced himself to think of the good dinners he had had at the Camp-fire Club of America, yum! yum! Also, of all the jolly stories told by the toastmaster and of the fun he had had at some other entertainments. Often while thinking of these things he caught himself laughing out loud as he trudged along the lone trail, FORGETTING the hateful pack on his back. ‘In this way’, said he, with a winning smile upon his manly and weather-beaten face, ‘I learned how not to fight the pack but to FORGET IT! Then he braced himself up, looked at the snow-capped mountain range ahead, hummed a little cowboy song and trudged on over the frozen snow at a scout’s pace.

Now that you know what a pack is, and what ‘fighting the pack’ means, remember that if one’s studies at school are hard, that is one’s pack. If the work one is doing is very hard, difficult, or tiresome, that is one’s pack. If one’s parents are worried and forget themselves in their worry and speak sharply, that is one’s pack. Don’t fight your pack; remember that you are a woodcrafter; straighten your shoulders, put on your scout smile and hit the trail like a man!

If you find you are tempted to break the Scout Law, that you are at times tempted to forget the Scout Oath, that because your camp mates use language unfit for a woodcrafter or a scout, and you are tempted to do the same, if your playmates play craps and smoke cigarettes, and laugh at you because you refuse to do so, so that you are tempted to join them, these temptations form your pack; don’t give in and fall under your load and whimper like a ‘sissy’ or a ‘mollycoddle’, but straighten up, look the world straight in the eye, and hit the trail like a man!

Some of us are carrying portage packs which we can dump off our shoulders at the end of the ‘carry’, some of us are carrying hiking packs which we must carry through life and can never dump from our shoulders until we cross the Grand Portage from which no voyagers ever return. All our packs vary in weight, but none of them is easy to carry if we fret and fume and complain under the load."

What great words of wisdom, that we can all learn from as we carry our "packs" on hikes and through life.