Scout Sunday Mass

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The anniversary of Scouting in America is February 8. The Sunday of or before the 8th is usually Scout Sunday. Because a scout is reverent, all faith denominations with a scout presence are encouraged to celebrate Scout Sunday. This event brings all types of scouts together- Scouts BSA, Sea Scouts, Venture Crew, Cub Scouts and Girl Scouts. Scout Sunday is a formal gathering so scouts dress in their full Field Uniform with neckerchief and merit badge sash.

Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic Church is Troop 242’s charter organization.  Scouts, scouters and families gathered for the 5:00 pm Vigil Mass on Saturday, February 6.  Scouts served as ushers and altar servers and Cub Scouts from Pack 242 were greeters and offertory collectors.  After the Mass, Troop 242 showed their support for the Cub Scouts who were awarded their Religious Emblems.   

No matter your denomination, Scout Sunday is an opportunity to gather with other scouts, practice your faith, and celebrate Scouting in America. 

Travis M
Troop 242 Chaplain Aide
Life Scout

Communications Merit Badge-Emma

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Hello everybody and welcome back to the Communications Merit Badge series. Here is Emma’s story.

National Youth Leadership Training, also known as NYLT, is a great way to learn how to be a better leader. I got the opportunity to go to this amazing scout event. Even with COVID-19 going on it still has been really fun so far. NYLT is usually a week long, similar to summer camp, but because of COVID it has been broken up into two separate weekends. I have learned so much from this experience. A great example of an exercise they use is the spaghetti marshmallow challenge, it is where you get 18 minutes to build a self standing structure with only spaghetti noodles (uncooked), a marshmallow that has to be on the top, and tape. My group had a hard time thinking of something that would work, but we managed it.

Communication Merit Badge-Donovan

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Hello all and welcome back to the Communications Merit Badge series. Here is Donovan’s story.

     The first quarantine campout was really fun and nothing that I expected on this campout.  We all came back refreshed  and which was a great thing. Mr. Degnon said that we did really well on this campout and that we should start doing it more often. This campout was really fun because each patrol had to bake a desert using the Dutch Oven. Braden and I found that this was really fun and something to do.

      We all set up into little spaces, took out the materials from our Chuck Boxes and we started working on our meals.  I was very down and I was thinking that the cake that we were going to make would be a disaster!  As I was looking at the other patrols, everyone was doing really well, one of the patrols had this whipped cream with Oreos in it and I was like, ohhh we’re not going to win now! Our Lightning Patrol cake was vanilla with strawberries in it and designs on the top with more strawberries. I knew that we probably wouldn’t win because it was so plain and kind of generic. As we were going through the process, I started to think we might have a chance. As the judges started the taste testing I was really anxious because the competition was tough. Each cake looked nice, especially Spartan Patrol. When the judges announced Lightning Patrol as the winners, Matthew, Braden and myself couldn’t believe it. And that’s my Quarantine campout story.  -Donovan Major

Our New Webmaster

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Hello troop, this is Abel with the last post that I will be making as webmaster. I am proud to say that my friend Bryan will be replacing me, and I think that there is no one better for the job. It’s been a fun year, and I picked up a lot along the way. I want to thank all of you guys for reading the post that I made, and I couldn’t have done it without Mr. Major and Travis. I know for sure that Bryan will take this site to new levels. Thanks for reading

–Abel

Canon Service Project

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On November 21, Lois Carpenter and I, along with our moms, participated in the Canon birdhouse conservation project. During that time, we planted a native flower garden and installed birdhouses for bluebirds and ducks at the Canon plant in Newport News. Mr. David Singletary arranged this conservation project along with people at Canon, and taught us about how something like this could be organized as an Eagle project, and told us about other kinds of conservation Eagle projects that he has seen. We got to work with Master Naturalists to plant native plants that attract and feed wildlife, and before we left, we saw a butterfly already at one of the flowers we planted.

Lois and I were the only Scouts from 242B and 242G, and there were about 20 scouts from other troops participating.
Bryan Higinbotham, webmaster Troop 242B

Communications Merit Badge- Brandon

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Hello everybody and welcome back to the Communications Merit Badge series. Here is Brandon’s story.

At the end of September, our troop went on a bouldering campout at Devil’s Marbleyard. I had never gone bouldering before, so I did not know what to expect. It was a very fun experience. I got to hike up to the marbleyard and go up the boulders with my friends. It was nice to get outside in the fresh air and experience the outdoors. When I first saw how high we would climb, I was a bit intimidated. There were different ledges, so when you thought you were at the top, you actually had a lot more to go. Sometimes there were huge boulders and gaps that were hard to maneuver around, but my friends helped me out. When we got to the very top, we ate some lunch and then  took a hike down the mountain and to the road where the cars were parked. I was very tired and sore from all the hiking and climbing, but it was a fun experience nevertheless.

When I first heard that we were going bouldering, I thought that it would be boring, but it was actually tons of fun. We don’t do things like this many times a year, so I’m glad I could get that experience. I encourage you to step out of your comfort zone, because you will get great memories from it. 

Hi Troop, this is Abel. This post is part of the Communications Merit Badge series, on which you can find more information here. Thanks for reading.

Communications Merit Badge- Bryan

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I got to go to summer camp for the first time this year and at summer camp I got to do 3 merit badges. The merit badges that I did are Communications, Archery, and Rifle Shooting.

My favorite merit badge that I did there was rifle shooting because I got to shoot rifles which I am good at because I do everything so slowly. I also liked the other merit badges that I did, which are communications merit badge with Mrs.Carpenter and archery merit badge with Mrs.Williams which were both a lot of fun.

-Bryan

This is the last Communications merit badge story for now but I will still be posting every Wednesday so be sure to keep an eye out.

Communications Merit Badge- Lois

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Summer Camp Cooking Experience

By Lois Carpenter

While at summer camp, my patrol members and I had a great time. It was the first
summer camp any of us had been to, and due to COVID we had to cook our own meals. It was a sizable task- we would cook for four days straight over a very sensitive camp stove, and because of dietary restrictions within our patrol, it all had to be vegan. Cooking vegan meals was something none of us had much practice with- we had only been to one other campout where this had been an issue- so cooking vegan proved to be a delightful challenge that pushed us to think through solutions, as scouting intended.


There were several substitutions that had to be made while cooking; instead of butter we
would have to use bananas, and we could not use chicken broth while making soup. I had never substituted items like this before, so the entire campout was very educational. I learned a lot about how to cook, and the deeper principles of cooking beyond just following instructions, just by working to make the recipes fit what I wanted to use them for.


Cooking in camp is always a team exercise, and I think that this summer camp served
really well to bring our patrol together and unite us as a team. Coming out of the campout, I can say with certainty that the food we prepared at summer camp united us unlike anything else. I would recommend summer camp to everyone, it was still a fun and worthwhile experience when following restrictions, and I think we should continue to hold our own long campouts where we cook, because it was a great way to get newer scouts their requirements, and because it inspired creativity within the patrols to cook new and exciting food.

Hi Troop, this is Abel. This post is part of the Communications Merit Badge series, on which you can find more information here. I will be posting a story daily until the series ends. 

Kayaking Campout

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Hello troop, this is Abel with the latest post. This week I will be writing about the Kayaking campout. Recently, the troop went to Fort Monroe with Sea Scout crew 1610 to go Kayaking. It was a lot of fun and 19 scouts earned their kayaking merit badge. We camped at Newport News Park and 4 scouts got rank advancements.

Thanks for reading, I hope that all of you have a great week. I will try to post a new article every Wednesday at noon.