Happy Holidays

We will not hold any further meetings until January.  Stay tuned for more information about the second half of the year, where we plan to start using the new Scouts Canada Canadian path programme.

Until then, all the best to you and all of yours!

 

Ringtail, Malek, Tic-Tac, Hawkeye, Rainbow and Rusty

Last Regular meeting for 2014

On Wednesday, December 10th, we will hold our last regular meeting for 2014 at St. Francis of Assisi - regular time. 

I was debating whether or not to hold one more following that, but since we don't have the school on the 17th we need to leave that one for the moment as "weather determined".  I have so far struck out on finding us an indoor activity for the evening...but am still looking.  If you have an idea for that - something fairly cost and distance efficient - please let me know.

I was a little disappointed on the low turnout at the Christmas party last week.  Some of you had let me know they could not attend, but not all.  I hope to keep an open communication with you all, so if you or your child have any concerns at all about the current program please let me know so I can take steps to rectify it.  The rest of the leaders and myself are looking to shore up the second half of the agenda shortly...keeping in what's working and repair what's not.  We all are more than happy to work with you all to keep things exciting!

Yours in Scouting,

 

Ringtail

Innisfil 2014 Inauguration

This evening, 1st Alcona Scouting were proud participants for the inauguration of our new Mayor, Gord Wauchope, new Deputy Mayor Lynn Dollin and all the ward counselors - both new and returning. 

 

Mason Hicks and Daniel Weichel were there to represent our colony and did a great job (albeit a comic-relief one) of escorting a couple of the new counselors to their seats following their swear-in.

 

The entire ceremony went extremely well, and all of the boys and girls from both 1st Alcona and 1st Stroud did a fantastic job in their duties.  I'm very proud of them all.

 

Being involved with the community, whether as a Beaver/Cub/Scout, a Fire Fighter, a Police Officer, a Town Counselor, a Mayor or many of the other important roles that various volunteers and employees take on is an incredibly important thing.  It's my hope that the boys will learn more about service during their terms with the group and beyond.

 

We wish the new Mayor and the entire council great success over the next four years and hope to be there to grant support in any way possible.  May you continue to be an inspiration to us all.

Santa Claus Parade Pics

 Pictures from the Santa Claus Parade can be found at the following address:

http://oskarweichel.smugmug.com/Other/Alcona-Santa-Claus-Parade-2014/n-Gqdqs/

Thank you to Mike Weichel for taking these!

 
 

Santa Claus Parade Updates

The Innisfil Santa Claus Parade starts on Sunday, November 30th at 1:30pm from Innisfil Beach in Alcona.

Access to anywhere East of the 25th sideroad will be closed at <b>NOON</b>.  So if you were intending on parking there please plan for this in advance.

We have decided to have the Beavers all meet at the Mac's Milk at the 25th sideroad for 1pm...and we will walk down to the float together.

It is expected to be warm and damp...please have your child dress appropriately.  Layers is always a good idea.  Also, I recommend having your child bring a towel or something they can sit or kneel on for the float...they'd be more comfortable.

Any questions, just text my cellphone.

Ringtail

Christmas Parade meeting

This Wednesday, the 26th of November we will meet at St. Francis of Assisi to build some decorations for our Santa Claus Parade float.  We will also practice a couple songs and play a game or two.

Just a reminder that this Sunday, November the 30th we will take part in the Alcona Santa Claus Parade.  We will meet at 1pm at Innisfil Beach Park.

Also, next week there will be no meeting on Wednesday.  Instead we will have a potluck Christmas party on Thursday, December 4th at the Lefroy Community Centre.  A signup sheet will be at the meeting tomorrow.

Ringtail

Firehall visit

On Wednesday the 19th of November, the 1st Alcona Beavers will be visiting the Innisfil firehall in Alcona to learn about fire safety and the amazing vehicles and devices that firefighters use in their duties.  We ask that the parents stay with us just in case the attending firefighters are called away for an emergency.

Take care,

Ringtail

Dinosaurs!

Between Remembrance day and planning for the Christmas parade we have decided to give the boys a change of pace and have them stretch their imaginations a little bit.  Our theme for this meeting will be Dinosaurs!

I'm planning out a little craft for them and there will be games to play...and time permitting a little story to tell.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out to me!

Ringtail

By the way, I still have leftover scissors from our last craft.  Please see me if you are missing yours.

Remembrance Day Meeting and Parade

On November 5, the 1st Alcona Beavers will have our Remembrance Day themed meeting.  Planned activities include some games and a little discussion about Remembrance Day and why we celebrate it.

We will also be discussing this coming weekend, when we have been asked to participate in the yearly parade at the Lefroy /Belle Ewart Legion on Sunday the 9th of November.  We will explain to the boys the importance of respect both during the parade and afterwards at the ceremony.

For the parade itself, we ask for the Beavers to arrive at the Legion itself at 10am (Robinson St. and Ewart St) in Full Uniform.  Once we are together, we will walk one street south to Arnold St and line up with the rest of the procession.  The parade route itself is usually fairly short...only heading along Ewart St. back to Robinson St. and then ending there for the ceremony.  Many great opportunities for photographs along the way.

Following the ceremony, the legion will usually have cookies and drinks for the kids.

As usual, if you have any questions regarding these meetings or anything else, please let me know.

Ringtail

Upcoming Events of note:

Sunday, November 30 -- Alcona Christmas Parade (Drop off at Innisfil Beach Park at 1pm, pick up is at Sobeys)

Wednesday, December 3 -- No meeting

Thursday, December 4 -- Christmas party at the Lefroy Community Centre with the Cubs and Scouts.

Jan 17 & 18th, 2015 -- Monster Jam -- Rogers Centre.  If we get 15+ people together with the Cubs and Scouts we get tickets at 35% off.

Next Meeting: BOOOoooo!

On Wednesday the 29th of October, we will celebrate Halloween at Beavers.

.  The kids are encouraged to wear their current favourite costumes to the meeting to show and share.  Our plans are to enjoy a treat, play a little Halloween themed game and watch an age appropriate Halloween film.

Looking forward to seeing lots of scary faces!

Ringtail

Ringtails Crafty Musings: Beaver Masks

On Wednesday, October 22nd, the Beavers will be making a craft to get them in the mood for Halloween.

If the Beavers own their own craft scissors we please ask that they bring them...to cut out of the ears, nose and teeth.

This is not a complicated craft, and could be done in so many ways.

Basically, supplies are:

Paper plate
Construction Paper (any colour wanted)
Crayons or Paints (we are going with crayons)
Toothpicks for whiskers
Glue
Elastic bands or popsicle stick
Sticky stars for decorations

Basically, creativity is key...the Beavers can do anything they want!

Looking forward to seeing what they can do.

Ringtail

Uniform Placement

1st Alcona Beavers had its investiture night on Wednesday.  For those in attendance, we had a wonderful evening and are now standing at 7 Brown Tails, 7 Blue Tails and 9 White Tails.  What a great mix!

 

I have modified the official document to show where to place the badges that your Beaver received.  Hope this helps!  You can sew them on, iron them on (where applicable), or you can pick up a special adhesive from craft stores or Walmart that works with badges.  I'm still not 100% certain how the latter item will hold up to the multiple washes that most Beaver vests will require (they do play hard, don't they?) but it does work for the most part.  Apparently helping it along with an iron on the uniform before placement helps with the adhesive.

 

Next week we will be doing a craft...a little mask work to get the kids in the mood for Halloween.

Ringtail

Up Next - Investiture Night

On Wednesday, October 15th, our youngest Beavers (currently known as "Kits") will partake in a very important ceremony.  They will officially become "Eager Beavers".  The investiture ceremony officially welcomes the Beaver into the Scouting programme and during this ceremony the Beaver receives a tail, neckerchief and badges for his uniform.
We will certainly help our young Beavers through the ceremony, but it's always nice if they already have a good memory of our Law, Promise and Motto - which I have posted here. 

We do welcome family to stay for the ceremony and take plenty of pics!

Ringtail

October 8th Meeting - Thanksgiving

 

Seeing as how the weather outside is getting rather wet and cool, I'm pleased that we were able to get our hiking in prior to this.   

 

This coming Wednesday we are back at St. Francis of Assisi, doing some crafts, playing some games and talking a bit about a typical Canadian Thanksgiving and why we celebrate it.

 

Encourage your Beaver to think about what Thanksgiving must have been like back in the days before electricity, supermarkets, refrigerators and television.  Wow, most kids these days struggle to think of the world before smartphones...this will really encourage them to stretch their minds a bit.

 

Here's some background on why we celebrate on a different date than our neighbours to the south, in case you were curious.

 

From Kidzworld:

 

The origins of Canadian Thanksgiving are more closely connected to the traditions of Europe than of the United States. Long before Europeans settled in North America, festivals of thanks and celebrations of harvest took place in Europe in the month of October. The very first Thanksgiving celebration in North America took place in Canada when Martin Frobisher, an explorer from England, arrived in Newfoundland in 1578. He wanted to give thanks for his safe arrival to the New World. That means the first Thanksgiving in Canada was celebrated 43 years before the pilgrims landed in Plymouth, Massachusetts!

For a few hundred years, Thanksgiving was celebrated in either late October or early November, before it was declared a national holiday in 1879. It was then, that November 6^th was set aside as the official Thanksgiving holiday. But then on January 31^st, 1957, Canadian Parliament announced that on the second Monday in October, Thanksgiving would be "a day of general thanksgiving to almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed." Thanksgiving was moved to the second Monday in October because after the World Wars, Remembrance Day (November 11th) and Thanksgiving kept falling in the same week. This year Canadian Thanksgiving is October 13^th!

Another reason for Canadian Thanksgiving arriving earlier than its American counterpart is that Canada is geographically further north than the United States, causing the Canadian harvest season to arrive earlier than the American harvest season. And since Thanksgiving for Canadians is more about giving thanks for the harvest season than the arrival of pilgrims, it makes sense to celebrate the holiday in October. So what are the differences between Canadian and American Thanksgiving, other than the date? Not much! Both Canadians and Americans celebrate Thanksgiving with parades, family gatherings, pumpkin pie and a whole lot of turkey!

Ringtail

 

Shining Waters Popcorn Sales

Only 1 month left in the 2014 Scout Popcorn Campaign!

Scout Popcorn is Scouts Canada's biggest and most successful fundraiser, giving almost 60% back to local groups. Raise all the money your Group needs to fund its ENTIRE Program.

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Hurry your sales orders are due by October 31st!
Popcorn is ready for pick up November 20 and 21st.
Bring a post-dated cheque dated December 5th.  

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• Never participated before? Its easy and we have lots of suggestions to get you started. 
• Prizes! We have another great line up of rewards for 2014. 
• Selling can be even be an investment in youth's future. From learning how to sell, to earning enough sales to participate in the Trails End Scholarship Program.

 

If you need any suggestions from within the group please feel free to talk to me, and we could setup some test scenarios on methods to help you and your Beaver sell.

Ringtail

Geocaching Meeting Wrap Up

On Wednesday the 1st day of October, the 1st Alcona Beavers converged at Centennial Park in Innisfil to learn about Geocaching.  Led by Tic Tac, all of the attendees learned how to use a GPS to find special treasure.

First we found an actual cache left by somebody within the wide expanse of a  tree, which gave us an opportunity to quiz the youngsters about the tree itself and some of its properties.  The youngsters learned about how some geocache's only contain a logbook, which we happily signed our groups names to.  1st Alcona Beavers has found their first geocache...and I'm certain it will not be its last.

As we were losing light fast, our next activity was a quick scavenger with a prize using distance and direction.  Tic Tac would announce North 5 paces, West 10 paces, etc; until all the boys found themselves in the area where a treasure could be found.  And what was it?  Well, what would any young boy be happy to find...a treat!  Potato Chips for everyone!

By the time this was finished we were in complete darkness, and as Centennial Park does not have much lighting we decided to wrap things up.  We performed our closing, and off the boys went to dreams of finding their own cache's on further days.

As section leader of 1st Alcona Beavers, my goal this year is to inspire the youth to pursue more and more activities that they would not normally get a chance to do, and I think Tic Tac did an amazing job of inspiring everyone about geocaching.  Even a lot of parents approached me and said how they look forward to doing more of this with their families.  Well done sir!

Good night and busy building tomorrow Beavers!

 

Ringtail

Tic Tac's Geocaching Hike

From Tic Tac:

The Meeting on Wednesday October 1st will be at Centennial Park, located on the corner of the 10th Side Road and the 7th LINE of Innisfil.  There is lots of parking, washrooms, and a covered pavilion in case of inclement weather.  We will meet at the pavilion for a quick little geography lesson about the basics of latitude and longitude and how we use coordinates to locate things.

This will be an outdoor activity, so please dress appropriatly for the weather, and bring a bottle of water.  There is a covered pavilion and washrooms at Centential park, we will meet rain or shine.

Please be there promptly at 6:45 because it is getting darker earlier and earlier.  We will be off on the hunt at 7pm SHARP. 

What is geocaching?

Geocaching is a real-world, outdoor treasure hunting game using GPS-enabled devices. Participants navigate to a specific set of GPS coordinates and then attempt to find the geocache (container) hidden at that location.
Here is a link to the OFFICIAL GEOCACHING WEBSITE FAQ ABOUT THE ACTIVITY, with a cool little youtube video to give you an idea of what we will be doing with the Beavers

http://www.geocaching.com/guide/default.aspx

Parents are more than welcome to participate in this cache hunt with their own GPS device.  Here is the link to the geocache we will be hunting for, with the coordinates.  If you are planning to give this a whirl,  please pre-program your GPS with the coordinated to save time.  Daylight is our enemy at this time of the year.

http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC194PQ_tree-hugger-2

Here are the coordinates in 3 different formats, depending on your GPS
Decimal 44.28113 -79.64652
DDD MM.MMM N 44° 16.868 W 079° 38.791
DDD MM SS.SSS N 44° 16' 52.068" W 79° 38' 47.472"

Automotive GPSs may or may not be capable for geocaching.  Your AUTOMOTIVE GPS must be able to GOTO a POINT using DIRECT coordinates AND BE CAPABLE OF DIRECT ROUTING, (AS THE CROW FLIES, STRAIGHT LINE FROM POINT TO POINT) to be able to use it for geocaching.  Otherwise, the GPS will just take you to the closet point to the cache on a road. 

There is also an APP section on geocaching.com if you want to try it with your SMARTPHONE.  Here is the link to that.  I used my iPhone and an older Android smartphone and the apps actually works quite well.

http://www.geocaching.com/mobile/default.aspx

If you have ANY questions at all, please email me (Tic Tac) at t4194bd@yahoo.ca and I will try my best to help you out!

Toronto Argonauts - Scouts Night

Scouts Night Fast Approaching

SATURDAY OCTOBER 25, 2014

 

The Toronto Argonauts Football Club presents an exclusive Scouts Night on
Saturday October 25, 2014 from 2:00pm - 7:00pm.

Pre-Game Activities start at 2:00 p.m.
Activities include a Scavenger Hunt around the Rogers Centre,
Scout Popcorn Show-n-Sell, Prizes, Games and much more!

Join us for a fun-filled unique game day of football as the Toronto Argonauts take on their rival the Hamilton Tiger Cats!

Tickets are specially priced at $31ea.
for Scouts, Family & Friends to enjoy the game.

BE SURE TO WEAR YOUR NECKERS | UNIFORMS OPTIONAL

Let us know if you want to purchase tickets

Ringtail's crafty musings: Our Hike

 During our hike with the cubs this past week, we encountered quite a few plants - and of course it is most children's basic instinct to grab, hold and inspect everything they come across. 

Not everything on the trail is necessarily the safest thing for kids to hold though and so we need to encourage them to "see with their eyes and not with their hands".

But what to do with a child like I was - who wanted to collect everything they came across?  Well...give them a digital camera and let them go to work, taking as many pictures as they want.  Copy these to a personal computer and have your child pick the ones they like the best.

With a little digital knowhow - which most kids have in spades, you could put together something like the collage I've created here.  If you ever want ideas of great and free software that can assist with this - let me know.  I personally use Photoshop.

These pictures were taken while I took my kids out yesterday on one of our local hiking trails with the purpose of collecting as many different kinds of leaves as they want.  They were my test subjects for the leaf collection hike we have this coming Wednesday.  I was thinking of different ways to make this craft idea more spiffy...and of course individual shots of colour from flowers would make a large difference.

 

The reality is, there is no limit to what the kids can do...it all comes down to time and imagination.

 

If you have ideas of crafts, please let us know - I'd encourage a guest post!!!

 

Ringtail

 

1st Alcona Apple Day - Sept 26-27

Apple Day is a traditional fundraising event that started right here in Canada. This is an annual event that provides our Scouting youth with an opportunity to show their appreciation to the general public for their support throughout the year. Our youth distribute apples as a way of saying “Thank You” to the community. Donations are accepted in exchange, but apples are not sold.

 

Any money raised during Apple Day goes towards improving the Scouting program through registration fee subsidies, outings, camping equipment, training and many other endeavours.

 

Each Group has a designated area to canvass including neighbourhood stores and other traveled areas. Although participation and date are up to the discretion of the individual groups.

 

The 1st Alcona Apple Day will be taking place on Friday evening (September 26th) and Saturday morning/afternoon (September 27th) in various locations throughout Alcona.  If you have not signed up your child to help out, please contact your section leader (myself for Beavers).  We do ask that a parent or guardian please be present for the event, especially for Beavers or Cubs in case they need to use the washroom.

 

Dress according to the weather, wear uniforms if you have them, bring along an Apple shining rag and bring a drink and snack for your child.

 

And for everyone, please donate generously when you receive an apple!

 

Ringtail