America Jane Speaks

After my children’s father passed away a few months ago, a friend (who had lost her baby just weeks before) gave us this book. What a blessing it’s turned out to be, as this book has become part of the routine of my children’s grieving and healing.

In order not to compete with content for which I’ve been paid to write, you can read my full review of this book on the wonderful website Summit Series for Families.

I will share one thing I did not include in my other review. When I first introduced this book to my children it was individually, one-on-one, so they were able to read and discuss the book privately with me. I didn’t plan it this way, but this is what happened. I found it interesting that when I was done reading to each of my children for the first time, they each went back to look at the same page: the pots page.

It’s a very simple illustration at first glance. A line of pots, ranging in size order from tiny to huge, each marked with labels identifying different levels of grief. The smallest pot says “Not Fair.” Middle pots say “Big Disappointment” and “Profound Loss”, among other things. The largest declares, “More Than I Can Bear.”

My children like to point out which pot they needed that day. Too often they pick the largest, although the last week or two they point to middle-sized pots. But this ritual of picking the pot seems to help them.

Above the pots is a shelf with several books, each with a different word on the spine representing the different kinds of loss a person may be grieving: “Child Died,” “Suicide,” “Divorce,” “House Fire,” and “Flunked Geometry” are among the many options. My children like to point to the books which apply to them.

It’s a book which is helpful, comforting, and, in many ways, lovely. I encourage you to read more about it if you or someone you know is going through a loss.

I also want to take this opportunity to thank those who have been patient and supportive as our family has gone through this difficult time, including those who only know me via this blog. Your long awaited reviews and updates are forthcoming. Thank you for your understanding.

I came across the fabulous blog, Mutual Insanity, ran by a young woman who’s been chronicling her journey through the Young Women program for over two years now.  Isn’t that a great title for a blog? Along with her blog she has tabs for mutual ideas, handout ideas, Girls’ Camp and more.

What a great project idea!

In fact, I think the initial set up of a blog (which can be pretty time-consuming depending on what you do) could count for a project in Knowledge, while running the blog for awhile could be a separate project for Individual Worth.

Lest the boys should feel neglected, this would be a creative way to fulfill some requirements for the Communications Merit Badge, which is required for Eagle, not to mention the Computers Merit Badge.

Another option for the boys is to create a blog to fulfill the hobby section of the Arts and Hobbies Bronze Award in the Venturing Program.

Gee, all this talk about blogging makes me want to start a blog!

Oh wait. I did that already. Nevermind.

What kid doesn’t love McDonald’s? Chicken McNuggets, Happy Meal toys, indoor playgrounds, fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies. What’s not to like?

Of course, your kids DO know about the Ronald McDonald House, right?

Come to think of it, I’m not sure my kids know about it. Hang on a minute…  Okay. Now they know.

Anyway, there are lots of ways kids can help out their favorite clown and get in on the philanthropic action. Whether they want to serve from the security of their own home or make a trip to an actual House, there are lots of easy ways kids can get involved.

This is also a great way to fulfill service requirements (and a few extra requirements, depending on your chosen act of service) in the Faith in God, Personal Progress, Duty to God or Scouting programs. A handy list of links to those requirements is at the end of this post.

First, what can kids do to help?

* Collect or make greeting cards to donate to your local House. Homemade cards, new cards, or the fronts of used cards are all useful. Ronald McDonald House gives these to families, who can send them to their ill child or give them out as thank you notes.

* Collect pop tabs. Not all chapters participate in this program, so check first. Your local chapter will also be able to tell you if there are drop-off locations elsewhere in your community, or provide you with pop tab collection containers to place in new areas. This is a great way to help Houses raise much-needed funds.

* Provide service at the House. Contact your local House to see what they need. You can help serve meals, plant flowers or do some cleaning.

* Sponsor a food drive to help stock their pantry with non-perishable goods.

* Collect items for a community yard sale and donate the proceeds.

* Help prepare and serve dinner at the House.

* Plan an activity for the children living at the house, like a face-painting party or story hour.

* Bake homemade cookies, decorate them, and donate them to families staying at your local House.

* Wash the cars of the families staying at the House.

* Make quilts for the beds. Check with the House first to see what’s needed. Some Houses have nicely decorated, themed rooms (often donated to the House by individuals or groups) and so may not be in need of this.  Other Houses have worn bedding and would greatly appreciate something new and fresh!

The needs of these Houses is huge and varied. You’re bound to find something of interest to your son or daughter. For more information about Ronald McDonald House Charities or to find a local House, go to the official website right HERE.

Related LDS Youth Program and Scouting Program Requirements:

Faith in God – Serving Others requirement 1: “Read and discuss the parable of the good Samaritan (see Luke 10:30–37). Plan and complete a service project that helps a family member or neighbor. After completing the project, discuss how it helped your faith grow stronger.”

Faith in God – Serving Others requirement 4: “Plan, prepare, and serve a nutritious meal. ”

Faith in God – Serving Others requirement 7: “Plan and hold a parent-child activity, such as a dinner, picnic, hike, day trip, or service project.”

Faith in God – Serving Others requirement 8: “Read the twelfth article of faith. Discuss what it means to be a good citizen and how your actions can affect others. ”

Tiger cub scout elective 11: “Help collect food, clothing or toys for needy families with your den or pack.”

Tiger cub scout elective 12: “Make at least two cards or decorations and take them to a hospital or long-term care facility.”

Wolf cub scout elective 9b/c: “Make a gift or toy like one of these (examples shown in book) and give it to someone.”

Bear cub scout requirement 9a: “With an adult, bake cookies.”

Bear cub scout elective 21b: “Help with a garage sale or rummage sale. This can be with your family or a neighbor, or it can be a church, school, or pack event.”

Citizenship cub scout belt loop requirement 3:“Participate in a family, den, or school service project.”

Reading and Writing cub scout pin requirement 2: “Read a book to a child or group of children.”

Complete a 10-hour service project for the House to complete the Personal Progress Individual Worth Value Project or Good Works Value Project.

Personal Progress Good Works requirement 6: “Spend at least three hours giving service outside your family. Ask your ward or branch Relief Society president or a community leader for suggestions for service. For example, you might take care of children while parents attend the temple; collect, make, or recondition toys or games for a nursery; accept an assignment to clean the meetinghouse; or perform errands for or read to a homebound person or others in need. Record in your journal the reactions of the person you served and possible goals for future service opportunities.”

Second class boy scout rank requirement 5: “Participate in an approved (minimum of one hour) service project. ”

Star boy scout rank requirement 4: “While a First Class Scout, take part in service projects totaling at least 6 hours of work. These projects must be approved by your Scoutmaster.”

Life boy scout rank requirement 4: “While a Star Scout, take part in service projects totaling at least 6 hours of work. These projects must be approved by your Scoutmaster. ”

This is a good idea for the Eagle Scout Leadership Service Project if you turn it into something significant, perhaps raising funds in order to redecorate and update rooms at the Ronald McDonald House.

Citizenship in the Community merit badge requirement 7, which includes learning about a community service organization and donating at least 8 hours serving that organization.

Do service at the Ronald McDonald House as part of the requirements to earn the Boy Scout Special Award in honor of the late, great Jimmy Stewart, the James M. Stewart Good Citizenship award.

Venturing Religious Life Bronze Award requirement 3: “ Plan and lead a service project such as helping to build a Habitat for Humanity house, participating in a community cleanup project, or taking on a fix-up project for a nursing home or nursery.”

Choose Ronald McDonald House Charities as your organization to serve as part of the Venturing TRUST Award requirements.

Serve the Ronald McDonald House as part of the “Serve Others” requirements in the Duty to God program.

That’s right folks. For a limited time only, Boy Scouts aged 17 years and younger have the opportunity to win one of 100 Robotics Merit Badges that launched into space with the Endeavor STS-134.

What a great way to acknowledge BSA’s latest merit badge!

Scouts need to earn the badge between April 12 and Sept 30, 2011 and submit their entries to the contest online. Go here to enter.

Winners will also receive an official Endeavor STS-134 mission patch, certificate of authenticity and photo of the shuttle crew.

For a full list of the requirements for the Robotics Merit Badge, check it out on the America Jane website right here.

Well the details for this highly anticipated new merit badge came out a little later than expected, but I’m sure it was well worth the wait. As a bonus, NASA’s getting in on the robotics action. The details about that are forthcoming. For now, you can find the full list of Robotics Merit Badge requirements on the America Jane website, right here.

The Boy Scouts of America has just released another knot to add to their growing collection. This one rewards scouts for getting inactive alumni more involved in scouting again. The scout applying for the award needs to be active as well. For all the details and to get the application, see the official list of requirements here. (Opens a PDF.)

BSA makes a few changes to its requirements at the beginning of each new year and 2011 is no exception. The America Jane website has all the current information, but here’s the lowdown.

Life Rank:

Requirement 6 gains a subpoint. Boys can now use the EDGE method to teach three requirements of an Eagle-required merit badge. Awesome!

Note:

Apparently there was an error with the 2009 printing of the Boy Scout Handbook, in which Bugler was listed as an option for fulfilling leadership requirements for the Eagle Scout rank. This has been corrected with the most recent edition. That error never made it to the digital archives of America Jane.

Merit Badges:

Minor changes were made to the Sports merit badge (a wording change in requirement 2) and Archery (for options A and B, the distance requirements for f(2) changed from 10 yards to 15).

More extensive updates were given to the Astronomy, Horsemanship and Nuclear Science merit badges.

Scouts who have already begun these merit badges can complete their work using the former requirements.

Happy 2011!

My heart has a special place for Greg Mortenson and his work in Afghanistan and Pakistan. His amazing journey from mountaineer to international philanthropist is outlined in the famous, inspiring book Three Cups of Tea.

From the website:

In 1993 Mortenson was descending from his failed attempt to reach the peak of K2. Exhausted and disoriented, he wandered away from his group into the most desolate reaches of northern Pakistan. Alone, without food, water, or shelter he stumbled into an impoverished Pakistani village where he was nursed back to health.

While recovering he observed the village’s 84 children sitting outdoors, scratching their lessons in the dirt with sticks. The village was so poor that it could not afford the $1-a-day salary to hire a teacher. When he left the village, he promised that he would return to build them a school. From that rash, heartfelt promise grew one of the most incredible humanitarian campaigns of our time.

If you haven’t read it, you must. It’ll make you want to do something to help.

If your kids haven’t read one of the youth editions, encourage them or make it a family event and read it to them yourself. It’ll make them want to do something to help.

Too often we read about something like this, wish we could help, and then do nothing because we don’t know what to do.

As you may have guessed, I have a suggestion.

The Pennies for Peace campaign is an excellent way for our youth to truly help some of God’s neediest children. It’s a way to raise awareness of the needs of others and encourage gratitude for the blessings we have here. It’s a way to empower kids to understand that they can make a difference in the lives of others. It’s something everyone can get in on, even those who only have pennies to give.

This idea is flexible and can be made to fit the kind of service project you’re looking for. Primary kids working on their Faith in God can run a small and simple campaign. Youth working on Personal Progress, Duty to God or Scouting awards can coordinate a campaign on a much larger scale.

The Pennies to Peace website has tips and everything you need to get started, from printable stickers to decorate your donation jars to letter templates for parents and Girls Education Fact Sheets. And it’s all free.

If your son or daughter decides to do this, please drop me a line and let me know how it went.

LDS and Scouting Service Project Requirements:

PLEASE NOTE: The Pennies for Peace program may NOT be used for the Eagle Scout award because fund-raising projects are not permitted for that award.

Faith in God – Serving Others requirement #7: “Plan and hold a parent-child activity, such as a dinner, picnic, hike, day trip, or service project.”  This idea may also be used for requirement #10: “Children may also plan and complete their own activity to serve others. ”

Personal Progress – Good Works Value requirement #7, which involves giving three hours of service outside your home. Also, this could be used for the Good Works Value Project which requires at least 10 hours of service and can additionally include involving other young women.

All three levels of the new Duty to God program (Deacon, Teacher, Priest) include requirements to plan and carry out service, both individually and with the quorum.

The Star and Life ranks of the Boy Scout program each require service projects totaling at least six hours of work. Again, please note you may NOT use fund-raising service projects for the Eagle Scout Award.

Venturing – Religious Life Bronze Award requirement #3: “Plan and lead a service project such as helping to build a Habitat for Humanity house, participating in a community cleanup project, or taking on a fix-up project for a nursing home or nursery.”

A Pennies for Peace campaign could be used to fulfill the service to others requirement for the Venturing Gold Award.

Speaking of horror stories (see Merit Badge Know How below), here’s another caution for parents. I heard about this from the same friend who works with the BSA to process Eagle Scout Award applications for our stake.

Just as lack of documentation can cause problems when a boy goes to apply for his Eagle Scout Award, another problem is when boys earn all their ranks but forgot about the so-called “joining rank” or rank of Scout. This MUST be the first rank earned. Boys who end up doing the work for Tenderfoot ranks and up without earning the Scout rank first have not earned those ranks as far as the BSA is concerned, even if that boy was given his awards in a Court of Honor, etc.

This error is not usually caught until the BSA Council is reviewing the records for a boy applying for his Eagle Scout Award. Guess what?

He doesn’t get it.

Ideally, leaders should be well informed to prevent this kind of problem. However, there is no better advocate for a scout than his parent. Parents, be aware of these things and stay on top of what’s going on.

If you want to avoid other potential Eagle Scout Award nightmares, see my post Merit Badge Know How.

If you want details on earning the Scout rank, click here.

The 2010 Historic Merit Badges: Signaling, Tracking, Carpentry and Pathfinding

Time is running out to earn the four historic merit badges available in 2010 only, as part of BSA’s 100th Year Celebration. Requirements must be completed no later than December 31, 2010.

I talk a little more about the four merit badges here and you can get a list of the official requirements here.

If you haven’t started on any of these yet, Pathfinding may be your best bet.