Why I Chose to be a Leader for Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts-or in other words-Yes I am Crazy!

My mom was ALWAYS around when I was growing up. She came to help at school, went on field trips, and had a snack ready for us when we got home at the end of the day. While sometimes it was a little embarrassing (think 13 year old girl on a field trip trying to avoid her mother), I knew that she would always be there for us and that made me feel safe.

I want my kids to feel the same way so I try to be involved as much as possible in their lives (which is fine now because they are 7, 8, and 9...but I will cry the first time my oldest tells me he doesn't want me to come on his field trip). One of my favorite activities to do with them is scouting.

I started out as the scout leader for my middle son because they didn't have anyone else to do it. Then I signed up to be the leader for my daughters girl scout troop. Now I am so glad I did because I get to spend all that time watching them interact with their friends and learn new things. Their friends know who I am and say hi to me when I see them. I hope that will continue as they grow older because I want them to feel comfortable with me around (then I can keep closer tabs on what they are up to)!

In college I spent a lot of time in classes with education majors (since child life was under the education department) and I LOVED the lesson planning and the projects. Now I could NEVER be an elementary school teacher (I love kids but I don't think I have the patience to teach them all day long for 9 months). I LOVE getting ready for scout meetings. I like taking the information they are supposed to learn and making it fun and interesting (because some of it is NOT that fun and interesting). Take, for example, our last boy scout meeting...we were supposed to learn about "Being Ready" in emergency situations. I knew that they had just spent 8 hours sitting in class listening to their teacher lecturing them so I decided to add a little more fun to our meeting. I created a jeopardy game out of the information they were supposed to learn (complete with prizes for the winning team). They LOVED the competition and after we were done I had them create a safety scene out of legos- SUCCESS. I was AMAZED at the things they created (a very detailed house on fire scene complete with flames and the angel of death). The boys had a blast and I hope they will remember the things they learned.

Besides helping my kids and their friends learn in exciting ways...getting ready for scout meetings also gives me something to do while they are at school! I work part time (6:00am to 10:00am) so I have the rest of the school day to find stuff to do! Of course I do the normal, boring, things like cleaning, cooking, laundry...but you can only do so much of that in a week. Getting ready for these meetings lets me be creative and gives me something to do to fill those long hours while my kids are gone.

I hope that when my kids grow up, they will remember all the fun things we did in scouts and appreciate the time I put into being they leader. Yet, even if they don't, I will always have the memories that we are making together, and those are worth all of the time I spend on scouting!