He's a Boy Scout Now

Tonight was Ankeny Pack 87's Blue and Gold Banquet. It was wonderful to see Matthew receive his Arrow of Light. It was hard earned because he missed almost a full year of Scouts last year and had to do much of the work on his own with his Dad rather than with his Den. (Which Ken reminds me is much more fun (the den stuff, that is)!)

The five boys in the beige shirts moved onto Boy Scouts today. The other five boys did not (and so were still wearing their Cub Scout shirts). If you click on the picture it will get bigger and you can see how very cool the Arrow award is. (Ken said, "my Arrow award was just the patch"....so someone went to a lot of trouble to make this special!) Ken indicated that a dad in Matthew's troop is quite a wood worker and perhaps he made these. The other Den of Weblos had different awards (also very cool). This will be something that Matthew will treasure as it is displayed on his wall. He received all his belt loops, pins and badges today (all at once). Kinda too bad, since the only thing he can wear on his Boy Scout uniform is the Arrow of Light patch. (The other things were supposed to go on his Cub Scout uniform, but since he didn't get any of them until today that isn't going to happen. I told him we can make something to display his achievments in.)

Matthew's last moments as a Cub.

Initially I typed, "This was one of the first things Matthew and Ken did when Matthew was a Tiger. They marched in a parade the church had to celebrate its anniversary." Then I looked at the next picture and realized that it must have been near the end of his Tiger Cub year, because his Den-mate is wearing his Wolf scarf. (His mother was more on the ball.)

This was Matthew with a former classmate and fellow scout. His mother is a dear friend. It was hard to be at "the" Blue and Gold, when it wasn't St. John's Blue and Gold. Enough said. Proud of Matthew tonight and look forward to the day he earns his Eagle. (Can't believe that next year Joel will be wearing the same uniform! I still have the hat!)

(Believe it or not, we put a down payment on Boy Scout camp today.....another milestone to achieve this summer...CAMP, and I am not talking Day Camp folks.....he will love it, I will be a worried wreck.) Enough said.