Trail Talk – 7/28/25

IMPORTANT NOTES AND ANNOUNCEMENTS FOR THIS WEEK:

Troop Meeting Tomorrow Night – We have a regular troop meeting tomorrow night! Make sure that if you are in town, you attend. I want to do something a little different for tomorrow night. We will do our normal opening, and we will have merit badge/advancement time like we normally do. However, I am going to shorten the merit badge/advancement time a little bit so that we can have an extended “fun” time. We will have watermelon, go outdoors, if the weather cooperates and just have some fun to remember and celebrate my dad and his life! He meant so much to so many of us and it is only right to continue to celebrate him!

Saturday, August 23 – At the church, there will be a Global Methodist gathering of churches that have scout troops like ours. This is a gathering of church leaders that are involved with scout troops like ours. The reason they are holding this gathering at Pathfinder is because they want to know WHY and HOW our troop is so successful so that they can bring ideas back to their own troops. We are the example!! That is awesome and it is all because of you! I want to show them exactly why we are the example by hosting a meal for the group gathered. I am looking for an ADULT leader to head this up and then am looking for several scouts to come and help cook the meal! It won’t be a huge thing and will be only for about 40ish people. We are looking to keep it simple. We just need the help! If there is an adult that would like to head this up for the troop and some scouts that would be willing to help come and prepare/serve the meal, please let me know ASAP! I have a lot of other stuff going on right now and cannot head this up. I will be present at the gathering however! Please get back to me soon if you can do this. Scouts WILL EARN SERVICE HOURS!!

Summer Merit Badges – Please remember, for the rest of the summer meetings, you are either working on T21, if you are a T21 scout, or a merit badge. You have the option to either work on partial Eagle required merit badges if you have a partial on one AND your counselor is present at the meeting. Counselors will not always be at meetings throughout the summer! The other option is to work on a non-required merit badge being offered by Mr. King, Christy and Mr. Clapp. You MUST be working on a merit badge during the meeting. If you don’t have a partial to work on, then you are working on one of the non-required merit badges.

Mini-High Adventure –Wow!!! Can you guys believe that the mini-high adventures is already happening THIS WEEK SATURDAY!! For those of you going on the mini-high adventure, you are meeting at the church at 7:00 a.m. on Saturday morning! Please be prompt so that you guys can leave at a decent time, get to your campsite and get it all set up Saturday night! You can “settle” in for a bunch of fun activities that are happening starting on Sunday!! Making sure you start preparing now and be ready for a GREAT TIME!!

EAGLE SCOUT COURT OF HONOR – Sunday, August 17th at 2:00 p.m. at Pathfinder Church. Please put this on your Calendars now! We will be celebrating 5 of our scouts earning the rank of Eagle Scout! These include Ivan Kwigizile, Ethan Wadsworth, Elliott Anderson, Ryan Greene and Ash Cowne!! That’s right, Ash is going to come all the way back here from North Carolina to participate in an Eagle Court of Honor with his old troop, the best troop around! Troop 244!! Let’s make sure as many of you come out to celebrate these scouts as possible! Let’s make it an afternoon to remember. I will need scouts to help participate and set up for the ceremony to arrive by 12:30 p.m. Thank you!

ANNUAL PLANNING MEETING – date CHANGE FOR THIS MEETING!! On Tuesday, August 12th,(please note the date change from August 19th) we will NOT have a regular troop meeting. Instead, we will be having our Annual Planning Meeting for the year. Adult leaders and Youth Leaders(any member of the PLC), put this on your calendar now! We will start as close to 6:00 p.m. as we can! THE TROOP WILL PROVIDE HAMBURGERS, BRATS AND HOT DOGS! We ask everyone else to bring a side dish to pass! The goal of this meeting will be to look ahead at the next scout year, plan out troop meetings, merit badges, and activities including campouts and such. I severely need the input of the YOUTH. I need Senior Patrol Leaders, Assistant Senior Patrol Leaders, Patrol Leaders, Assistant Patrol Leaders, Troop Scribes, Quartermasters and so on. All adult leaders are invited to help with ideas and plan activities for the next year! Your input is so important to making this troop one of the best!

Scoutmaster Minute – Family and Friends – You know, I don’t have anything profound to say in this troop trail talk at all. However, I do want to emphasize the importance of family and friends, and I want to do this because of what has been circulating through my head today. As mentioned earlier, today would have been my dad’s 74th birthday. Many, many of you know my dad and you know he was a great man. He loved his family, and he loved scouting. Every year on his birthday we would either get together, go out to dinner or at least talk on the phone, without fail! My entire life. This year is different because he is no longer with us. For those of you that didn’t get a chance to know my dad, you missed the absolute BEST Scoutmaster and person ever! I hope you will allow those of us that loved him and knew him to tell you about him! I miss my dad every day. A lot of people say the “first year” is the hardest, but I don’t see it getting much easier even after the first year. Yes, there are a lot of “firsts” during that first year but after 47 years on this planet with my dad, I will always miss him and everything he and I did together. As I also mentioned above, my mom is in the hospital right now and I thank God that it is not as serious as with my dad. It is frightening though and when I went to visit her, it did bring back a lot of nightmarish flashbacks from my dad’s time in the hospital. Family…treasure your family whenever and however you can! I also want to talk about friends a minute. I had so many friends reach out to me today because they knew today was my dad’s birthday. They reached out to see how I was doing and dealing with it. I want to THANK each and every one of you for doing that. Friends are a gift from God. While Family is given to us automatically, friends are people that you search out and become close to. I thank God for my friends every day. Please know that when you have a friend who is going through a rough time, reach out to them and check on them. When you are going through a rough time, know that your friends are there for you! Family and friends…keep them close and treasure them always!

 “What Troop Does More!!” – 244