If all the other kids jumped off a bridge, I know now that my son wouldn't.

I just came to the realization that choosing a Boy Scouting Troop is alot like choosing a college.  You visit the troops, interview the Scout Master and fellow boy scouts, talk with your family, review financial records to see what you can affort, then make a decision and HOPE AND PRAY you didn't make the wrong choice.

My 11 year old has been involved HEAVILY with Scouting since he was in 1st grade.  Actually, he saw the Cub Master at the kindergarten open house and BEGGED me to let him join.  I concented only to find out that he had to wait until the next year.  And he was sure to remind me the very next year, even though we had moved and he had to change schools.

After that first TIGER year, I was recruited into a leadership position.  I ran a den of boys for their WOLF and BEAR years and co-ran a WEBELOS 1 den.  This year he is a Webolos 2 (or a 2nd year Webelos since the webelos program is an 18 month program).  I have been stepping back, and not actively leading a den this year, instead focusing my time on SCOUT COMMITTEE membership.  I have been running an active recruitment campaign to replace all of the leaders and committee members who will be leaving the pack to join a troop this year.

My son want's to earn his EAGLE rank.  I have no doubt that he will earn it, but I want to do what I can to find the right troop for him to do so.  I guess when you think about it, it is similiar to stacking the deck.  I mean we want our children to succeed, and it is the job of the parents to "stack the deck" in anyway we can to set them up on the road for success.  For my children, this means I make sure they have the tools they need to accomplish their goals.  I make sure they have all the school supplies they need, the clothes that won't get them made fun of, etc.  I also know that college will be out of the realm of something I can pay for, so we find something they like, and work the hell out of it so that they can have a shot at something.  My 11 year old wants to join the service.  (really I think it's more of an obsession with Call of Duty games)  He would be perfectly cut out for it.  And he realizes that earning his EAGLE rank will help him in obtaining a higher pay grade upon joining the military.  And he has fun in scouts.

But I digress.  We have been working on visiting troops to find a good match.  It helps that it is part of the Arrow Of Light award too!  For the last 5 years in scouts we KNEW that we were gonna join Troop 942 out of St. Andrew's Methodist.  95% of the boys in our cub scout pack joined there.  And it was the 'big names' of our pack.  The overachievers.  The ones with parental involvement.  It just seemed like a natural progression, both for me and for my son.  We were even sold when we visited the troop.  I spoke with the other parents that had joined in the years before me, and really felt like it was going to be like a reunion for me.  My son liked the active calendar and seeing his old buddies.  The meeting was CHAOS.  Lots of high energy.  I asked a giant list of questions to the Scout Master.   I was hooked.

Until I visited with another troop that the remaining 5% of our cubscouts cross into.  Troop 829 out of St Sabina Catholic Church.  My son and I walked into a small group of Webelos 2's sitting down with the Scout Master.  He was telling the boys all about the differences in Cub scouting vs. Boy Scouting.  It was the way he did it that was so special. He was asking questions and letting the boys tell each other.  If they got stuck, he guided their answers and thought processes by asking different questions.  It was the very embodiment of BOY LEAD with an ADULT guiding the process.

Things just got interesting.

I really was liking what I saw.  I liked how they seemed to be working the scouting system the right way.  Then the meeting opened.  The boys repeated the oath and the law.  It hit me then that I didn't see that in my meeting with 942.  Both troops worked on merit badge requirements, one was more active meeting once a week, and seemed to be into activity and fun, and the other was slower and met only 2 times a month but participated in more of the serious side of scouting.

My mind was made up.  I wanted the serious quieter troop, since they seemed to be 'growing MEN' instead of just providing a fun after school activity.  (don't get me wrong, the busier troop also had plenty of advancement, but it seemed that it was the core super involved parents kids who were advancing, which made me question if my son would do it without me PUSHING him)  I had no idea how to get my son to go along with it.  I was certain that he would want to join the troop we had been planning on crossing into since we found out about it.

Then a miracle happened.  He and I sat down and I asked him which he would like to join.  He told me he was still thinking about it, and wasnt sure how to decide.  I asked him to think about pros and cons of both, and think about what he wanted to get out of being a scout.  He told me he wants to be an EAGLE scout.  And he was kind of thinking that the SLOWER more Serious troop would be the best place for him to make Eagle.

My heart skipped a beat.  I was so astounded that an 11 year old could come to that conclusion on his own.  It helped show me that the Scouting program and all the work I have put into participation has been worth it.  I am raising the kind of kid I want to raise.

Then it got even better.  He informed me that he wants to make 1st class in his 1st year, and he knows that 829 is the best place for that, AND he figures that after he gets all of the basics covered, if he starts to get bored, he can transfer to the more active troop.

It was like he was reading my mind.  I had been thinking that it would be a good tool to have in my parent arsenal that he could transfer to a more 'fun' troop when I start to loose his interest due to cars, jobs, and girls, and sports.  If he joined the more active fun based troop then it would be harder to convince him to join a more  serious troop if the time came that his interest was waning.

So we emailed the Scout Master and told our Cub Scout pack the news, we were going to buck tradition and go with a different troop than most of our other scouts.  We were going to go somewhere that my son didn't really know many of the kids, and we made an unpopular choice.

I think that unpopular choice to go against what the whole crowd is doing is an important thing.  My son learned (and demonstrated) that what everyone else is doing is not the same as what  is best for you, and that it is okay to go against the main stream.

I have never been so proud.

Exciting week!

So much has been happening this week, it's hard for me to focus on any of the things I said this blog was going to be about.  So I want to get the exciting things off of my chest so I can settle back down and get to working on those projects and resolutions I said I was going to do.

1.)  I just hired an attorney.  A good one too!  I seriously LOVE him.  I liked him quite a bit after the initial consultation, but now that he is hired, MAN!  he is awesome.  I have no doubt in my mind that he is the right man for this child support/custody/paternity thing I have going on.  If you are in the St. Louis area and need a lawyer for family law, I highly recommend Bruce Eastman of the Eastman Law Firm.  He has very reasonable rates, and a wonderful sarcastic bulldog type of attitude that kept me grinning throughout the appointment and made me feel very confident in my case.

2.)  The kids on my new bus route are not too awful.  (except the middle schoolers, but that is typical, and even they aren't too bad.)  If you wonder about why middle schoolers have such a bad reputation, let me tell you about the safety training meeting I attended this summer hosted by GRAYRAM TACTICAL.  They told us that a study was done about school violence and it was determined that most violence was committed by 12-13 year old boys (middle schoolers!) and it was statistically more likely to happen on a Wednesday in the month of October and was most likely going to involve fist fighting.  But really, Middle school kids do not have the more adult common sense of high school kids, and are not as afraid of getting in trouble as elementary school kids are, and are trying to make a name for themselves and to get attention.  It's like in Middle School they are on a bus for the first time, and they think they are grown, and MAN!  It can be a bad combo.  Luckily, I know they just want structure and are only trying their limits and things will settle down soon enough.

3.)  My husband has never met his BIO dad.  And for years genealogy has been a hobby of mine.  It has always aggravated my COD (that's OCD but with the letters in alphabetical order the way they are supposed to be!)  that half of my kids family tree looks like it was hit by lightening and just stopped growing.

This is really what their family trees look like... a huge chunk is missing!

     So I have been hunting for anything about this man who is my husbands dad.  All I had was his name and that he had been in trouble (read: gone to jail at least once).  I was able to find a birthday for him thru the free court search site here in Missouri.  It's called CASENET and can be found HERE.  Most states have some kind of free judicial lookup of court records somewhere if you are willing to dig.   Anyways, I posted on ANCESTRY.COM a message seeking information about the bio dad (we will call him Gary) parents.  I made it very clear that I was not trying to stalk or harass a person who didn't want to be found or who didn't want contact, and that I really just wanted to know Gary's parents names so that I could flesh out a family tree for the kids.  After a year or more of no responses, I got a reply from Gary's niece.  I was able to call her and get a TON of information.  And she seems like a pretty cool chick on top of it all.  So I am hot on the case of investigating all of the new family members and that whole branch of the family tree.  

4.)  I had an IEP meeting with my stepson's school.  Hopefully now the testing will be able to help us help him better.  I have hated to see him struggling like he does, and I don't want to get angry with him for not trying or whatever if he is physically UNABLE to do so.  Now finally, the school district is on the same page as we are, and we are going to be able to begin the evaluation and referral services.  

5.)  The mother of the Stepson (who is like my real son anyway) has lost custody of her youngest and the only remaining child that she had custody of.  If you are counting that makes 3 kids, 3 different dads, that she has LOST custody and visitation with.  I am slightly worried that she will do something stupid and I will have to explain adult problems to a kid who is just starting to settle in here.  I just don't want her to kill herself or something (overdose!)  I am sure she loves him, but needs to get help so she can effectively parent her child.  I don't want him to lose a mother without having the chance to understand that she isn't doing things to HURT him, she just has an addiction and it isn't his fault.  I think right now he is too young to understand that whole aspect of it, and it troubles me that she may force me into having to try to explain that to him.  I don't want him filled with anger at her or at us for any reason.  It's sad really.  However, I am glad that her youngest child is now away from her, for the child's sake.