Awards, Awards, Awards

If your Scouts are anything like mine, they LOVE to earn their awards every month!  At the Pack Meeting each month we have a nice little ceremony where each boy is called up individually and his awards for the month are announced to everyone.  We only had 9 scouts last year (our first year of charter, very small school), and were easily spending upwards of $100 a month on awards, especially belt loops which are $1.79 each.

Since many of our cubs have earned a LOT of the available belt loops in their first year, I was looking for something else.  Cubs are allowed to earn belt loops more than once in their Cub Scout years, but who wants to do the work all over again only to get the same award at the end of the month?  Enter the Activity Segment.  The great folks over at Ideal Emblem have little activity patches for just $0.49 each!  These little guys go around a 3" center patch, which is only $0.99.  Inexpensive, adorable, and different.  What more can you ask for?

Here's a shot of my first order for the boys that went to day camp, as well as the ranks they have earned.

Note that these activity segments are NOT a BSA item.  Some council shops carry them, others do not, and they are not to be worn on the uniform.  I'll be using these for my second and third year scouts who are earning belt loops for a second time.  I'm a Cubmaster...Now What, has taken the time to make activity segment award cards, and was kind enough to share the files.  Definitely check out the entire blog for really great ideas!

My own son loves earning belt loops, but doesn't like wearing the belt.  Now that he's in his third year of scouting, he has more belt loops than space on the belt!  Scout Stuff has this great little frame with cut outs for the belt loops that's fairly inexpensive.  He loves having them on display instead of sitting in the closet on the belt he doesn't wear.

For our next scouting year, we are bringing in the BSA Family Program, as well as the Messenger of Peace program to give the boys more opportunities to earn patches and pins.    More on both of those later.  What do you do when your scouts have earned belt loops for the second time?  Who pays for the duplicate?  Do you think activity segments would work for your group?

Until next time,

CubMom