Another busy term including the first of two international camps for the year.
Over 30 of of our young people and leaders ventured abroad to the slopes of Andorra for a week of skiing – amazing fun for all. We now can’t wait for our adventure to Switzerland in August!
The leaders have worked very hard to once again provide an exceptional range of activities to over 170 young people. We’re a growing group and there are exciting plans for this summer… watch this space!
Liam
Group Scout Leader
Beavers
Beavers have been very creative this term: we made food kebabs for wild birds visiting our gardens, delicious toasties for ourselves to enjoy, paper rabbits for the Chinese Year of the Rabbit, shortbread for Burns Night, lovely gifts for Mother’s Day and chocolate nests for Easter. Our evening of Stop Frame animation creating superhero stories definitely showed us how imaginative our Beavers are (my thanks to parents (and Ed) who helped out at this meeting). Whilst participating in these fun activities we’ve learned about what makes a balanced diet, the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch, Chinese New Year as well as many things about Scotland including whether or not we like haggis!
At the beginning of February, many of our Beavers joined with 200 other Beavers when they attended the annual District Beaver Party at Hinchley Wood Secondary School for an afternoon of craft, games, decorating biscuits and watching a superb interactive show of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland performed by the Cat’s Grin Theatre Company.
RNLI’s Lifeboat Station at Teddington is one of the newest lifeboat stations and is also one of the first to cover a river rather than estuarial waters or the sea. Teddington is one of four lifeboat stations on the River Thames and we are extremely fortunate to live nearby to it and privileged to visit with Scouts learning not only about the RNLI and their boats but also about water safety. We are very thankful to the RNLI volunteers for making our visits so memorable.
Our Beavers were the first from the Scouting Association to revisit the local Buddhist Shinnyo-en Temple since Covid-19. During our visit members kindly explained to us the history of Buddhism; we decorated candle holders and each Beaver was allowed to try out the ceremonial gong!
It was our pleasure to once again welcome mums/special persons to our first Mother’s Day Tea since Covid-19 affected our lives. The Beavers love to serve their mums with tea and cake and it is an opportunity for our 1st Molesey community to chat and get to know each other. Our thanks to those
who came along and helped make the evening special.
Monday Cubs
The Monday Cubs have enjoyed a huge variety of activities this term. We’ve had skills sharing, hobbies and athletics nights and it’s been really exciting to welcome new Cubs and leaders to the team this term.
Pancake day is always a firm favourite. Each cub fried and added topping to their own pancake before eating it all! Lots of pancake flipping, and enthusiam exhibited on this evening!
Cubs explored Molesey in a Local Knowledge Challenge, looking for specific locations in the neighbourhood. This evening really demonstrated how well the Cubs knew their local area, but also that they knew how to stay safe!
We also learned about fair trade products and prepared and cooked delicious fair trade cholate bananas on the fire at the Hut.
The Cubs learnt how to change wheels and look after a car on a mechanics evening – real life skills!
We ended the term spending a outdoorsy and adventurous night at Polyapes Scout Camp where cubs played wide games, learn knife work, and roasted marshmallows by the campfire. At last meeting, we give back to the community by litter picking around the Wilderness Park area. We collected five huge bags at the end!
Well done cubs and leaders for this amazing term full of fun activities!
Tuesday Scouts
Kicking off the Spring term Team Tuesdays ventured up to Polyapes Scout campsite, for a night of den building, wide games and sausages over the fire. What a way too dust off those Autumn term cobwebs! The following week required our Scouts to attend with their best mad Scientist mannerisms, as we were creating Bristlebots (Small, motorised robots using the head of a
toothbrush, with dodgem like characteristics.)
One of the highlights of the Term came in the form of the Scottish celebration Burns night. We learnt all about the Scottish Author & Poet Robert Burns, cooked and prepared Haggis, neeps and tatties and participating in our very own Burns Night Supper. A big shout out to our Master of Ceremony our very own group chairman Bruce!
The following few weeks saw our patrols work on their teamwork by going head-to-head on Games night, competing over a collection of disciplines such as Lawn Bowls, table tennis, twister. They also honed their photography skills creating long exposure light art with the aid of DSLR cameras and sparklers.
As always, we enjoyed Shrove Tuesday in the usual fashion with the addition of a judged competition. Followed by American cooking night led by one of our fantastic Young Leaders, William. Big thanks to all our Young Leaders for their continued support, you’ve all been such assets!
Most prominently, it’s been hard to forget all the adventures we’ve had outside of our weekly meeting such as visiting the Met Police Maritime Unit for some of our older scouts. This involved a search dog demonstration, patrol of Westminster under the night lights and a blast up past Canary Wharf! Not forgetting a fantastic Bush Craft weekend in conjunction with our friends at 9th Walton Air Scouts. Finally, a big congratulations is in order to all the Scouts who participated in the annual District Day Hike. An incredible set of results from all our teams saw us place 1 st, 2nd, 3rd & 5th overall!
Big well done to you all, catch you in the Summer Term for more adventures!
Wednesday Scouts
It’s been another cracking term on Wednesday evenings – so a big thanks to the Wednesday team for helping to power another incredible 12 weeks of fun.
Everything we do on a Wednesday evening is designed to provide children with life skills, or allow them to experience adventure. There’s been plenty of both this term!
New Skills:
Cooking (and lots of it) for Chinese New Year, Burns Night and Shrove Tuesday.
Electronics – we made Bristlebots and completed stage one of the ‘I can solder’ course!
Together with the Monday Cubs, we’ve cleared over 10 bags of litter from The Wilderness and also had fun exploring the Surrey Hills on the District Day Hike. Our best ever performance with 5 of our 6 1st Molesey teams coming in places 1 to 5 of the whole competition!
We visited White Beeches in Godalming for a weekend of bushcraft and survival skills including pioneering, shelter building, backwoods cooking and rabbit skinning! Lovely to be joined by our friends at 9th Walton – loads of new skills and friends!
Adventure:
Skiing in Andorra, speeding through London on a police boat, rifle shooting, tomahawk throwing, powerboating, rabbit skinning…
… skydiving and scuba diving withiun the space of a week.
3 Gold Awards presented this term, well done to Eddie, Alex and Freddie – very well deserved!
Have a cracking Easter Wednesday Ninjas!
Thursday Cubs
Oh my, what a busy term we have had and earnt so many badges too! We’ve met police officers and their horses, sat in police cars, cooked and eaten pancakes, taken wheels off of boat trailers, shared our hobbies, serviced a car, hunted for landmarks in Molesey, visited Jump In and that’s just a very short summary of the many adventures we have had together.
We’ve had 10+ Cubs join our Thursday Pack, which is testament to how utterly brilliant and welcoming our Cubs are towards new members. Our Sixers and Seconders continue to support their Sixes with their excellent leadership skills and it is a delight to watch them grow in skill and confidence each week. We are also very grateful to our Young Leaders who support the Cubs so well each week with their kindness and enthusiasm.
One of our Thursday Cubs said ‘the best bit of Thursday Cubs is everything you get to do with your friends. All the different activities you get to take part in and exploring with your new friends. Everything about Cubs is great, in fact it’s epic!‘
We are looking forward to more adventures together in the summer, particularly camping and getting back out on the river.
We are very proud of our Thursday Cubs and wish them all a very lovely Easter break!
Explorers
The Explorer Unit begin their Spring and Autumn terms with a planning meeting, where they are given an opportunity to decide what they want to do during that term. This term we managed to meet each of their ideas, except for “painting with Bob Ross” and “building a trebuchet”! But we won’t rule them out – maybe another time!
Activities this term included:
• backwoods cooking over the campfire (thanks to the Tuesday Scout leaders)
• Trading Post (each team is challenged on their Scouting skills, imagination, teamwork and business acumen)
• annual pancake making session for Shrove Tuesday (some edible some not!)
• baking cupcakes (continuing with our Chef badge)
• another walk with Jim, fast becoming a firm fixture, this time around Esher Woods and surrounding area (thanks Jim)
• stop motion animation – there was a running theme – don’t ask! (Ed’s been busy this term)
• a first for Explorers – Bristlebots – a simple toothbrush robot (our thanks to Paul W)
• badminton on hired courts at Three Rivers Academy sports facility (great idea)
• a great Quiz night provided by our very own Will, Max and Ciaran (thanks lads)
Some of our Explorers have been participating in the Surrey Scouts Young Leader Scheme. This entails attending training days, online training as well as volunteering in the younger sections gaining practical skills and leadership experience whilst obtaining their Missions. Congratulations to Eloisa, Elin and Evie in being awarded their Young Leader Belts by Jonathan Perkins from District. They are now undertaking the Senior Young Leader Scheme, which commenced with further online training and a conference held at Guildford County School. They reported that both were extremely beneficial. Well done Young Leaders!!
Save the date!
Molesey Beer Festival – 6th & 7th October 2023
The beer festival will return in 2023!
This is one of the biggest fundraisers 1st Molesey organises, and a fantastic social event for all the family, so do put the date in your diaries.
Thank you to Not Just Travel for continued sponsorship
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