New Candidates to the Lagunas Chapter.

Just a few hours ago I had the opportunity of holding an election for the Slate Canyon Ward in Provo. We have two Youth candidates and one Adult leader nomination. I am looking forward to Maple Dell when we are joined by three more members of our Chapter. Let us continue to spread the word and find those Scouters who better exemplify the Scout Oath, Law, Motto, and Slogan. 

James F. Levao Chapter Advisor-Lagunas Chapter

Catching Up

It's been a while since our last post, so we've got a bunch of things to catch up on:

• Attendance at the National Jamboree:  Michael Eyler served on the OA Service Corps at the National Jamboree.
• Another Eagle:  Gabe Richardson was awarded his Eagle last month.  Congratulations!
• Trail Maintenance:  We really fell down on our maintenance of the trail this year.  We did get in one maintenance hike in September, and a couple of units hiked the trail after we recommended it to them.
• Movie Night:  On Nov 12, we had 12 youth and 3 adults gather to hold elections, eat pizza, and watch Time Bandits.  A good time was had by all.
• New Chapter Officers:  We have a new CEB!  Ian Frandsen continues to serve as Chapter Chief, David Armond is still our Vice Chief, Gabe Richardson is our new secretary, Trevor Dean is our new Vice Chief for Ceremonies, and Henry Avery is our new Vice Chief of Troop/Team Representatives.  Good luck to all of them in the coming year.

Don't forget, the lodge is holding Lodge Conference on Dec 29-31 at the Delta Man Camp (the same place we attended conclave in April).  The cost will be $40 if you register before 12/15.  Sign up now.  (If you're going, please let Pat Eyler or Ian Frandsen know if you've registered so that we can arrange rides.)

Two New Eagles!

With all the rush around our Spring Fellowship and Ordeal, we've been remiss in recognizing a great accomplishment by two of our brothers.  Ian, our Chapter Chief, and David, our Vice-Chief, both had their Eagle Boards of Review on Thursday and are the two newest Eagles in our Chapter.  Congrats guys!

I know we have several more who are close, let's help them make it happen.

Spring 2010 Fellowship (and new members)

We had a great fellowship this weekend. Fourteen candidates went through their ordeal including five from our chapter:  Henry, Hunter, Jon, Joshua, and Mesake.


The weather started out fine but during the night the rain started to fall and then turned to snow.  By morning we had a couple of inches covering our campsite.

We spent Saturday working on several camping and picnic grounds in American Fork Canyon.  Among other jobs we spread road base and gravel, cleared brush from stairways, and shovelled snow from the walkway into camps.

After a hard day's work, we enjoyed a great dinner together welcoming all of our new members.

What's Cooking at Roundtable (May 2010)

Our chapter was asked to help with a cooking demonstration at the May Roundtable.  Since this was a last minute request Michael and I (Pat) decided to do it alone.  Everyone else was demoing dutch-oven cooking (and pie-makers, a close relative), so we wanted to do something different — backpacking food seemed like the way to go.
We took along three stoves, two gas cartridge stoves and our WoodGas LE Stove.

We made up one of our favorites, Chicken, Raisins, and Cashews. We cooked up a bigger batch before the demo so that people could try it, then we made a single batch to show how easy it is to make.  Here's what you need to do to make two servings (plan on sharing with a buddy since the all chicken needs to be eaten at one meal).

• Assemble ingredients:
  
  
  
  • 1 7.5 oz foil pack of chicken
  • 2 cups instant rice
  • 1/2 cup cashews 
  • 1/2 cup raisins or diced, dried apricots 
  • 1 tsp dried onion flakes
• gather ziplock-style bags: 4 qt, 4 snack size
• find an old stocking cap (this will be a combination hot pad, cozy, and placemat)
• put 1 cup of rice into each of 2 qt sized baggies.
• put 1/4 cup of cashews into each of 2 snack sized baggies
• put 1/4 cup of dried fruit into each of 2 snack sized baggies
• put 1 bag of rice, 1 bag of cashews, and 1 bag or dried fruit into each of the remaining 2 qt sized bags.  (put the foil pack of chicken into one of the bags)

To prepare the meal:

• Boil 2 cups of water (more if you want a hot drink to go with it).
• Place the bag containing the rice in the stocking cap and open the top of the bag.
• Carefully pour 1 cup of boiling water into the bag of rice, seal the bag up (squeeze out most of the air), and gently knead it while holding the bag in the cap.
• Let sit for about 10 minutes, then add half the chicken, the cashews, and the dried fruit.
• Roll the brim of the cap to form a bowl, and set the bag inside it.  Eat right from the bag.

Other than the several baggies and an empty foil wrapper (which all fit into one of the qt sized baggies for packing out), the only cleanup you should have left is your spoon.
What kind of backpacking foods do you like to assemble and take with you?

New Member of our Chapter

The Hotametaneo'o chapter held an Ordeal on Apr 30-May 1, and one of our candidates was there with a couple of Arrowmen from our chapter. Fotu and the rest of the candidates did a great job of cleaning up the trails, grounds, and volleyball pit at the Alpine Bowery.  They endured a cold night with light rain and snow, but everyone seemed happy and healthy at the end of the day.

After the candidates were inducted in the Ordeal ceremony, they were joined by parents and lodge members at a feast of BBQ chicken, dutch oven potatoes, and cobbler.  Food always seems to taste so good after an ordeal.

We're looking forward to Fotu joining us in our activities in the future, especially the Fellowship Weekend and Ordeal we have planned for 21-22 May at the Granite Flat Campground above Tibble Fork Reservoir.  Hopefully many of our candidates will join us there.

Spring/Summer 2010 Events

 Since summer is always a busy time, here's a list of upcoming events.  We don't expect every arrowman to be at every activity, but we'd love to have you come to as many as you can.  It should be a great summer.

• May 14-15 District Camporee -- we're going to have a chapter presence to hold elections, have an OA cracker-barrel, run a call-out ceremony, and perhaps help w/ staffing (we've talked about establishing a trading post as a fund raiser, but that will probably wait until 2011)
• May 28-29 21-22 Ordeal and Fellowship -- serving as an elangomat is a great way to be involved in OA service.  If you can't be there the whole time, try to make it to the chapter feast on Saturday evening, it will  be a chance to bond with the rest of the chapter, including the new inductees. (Sorry about the date change, we needed to slide it to support the Ranger District.)
• June 8-12 Lodge TeePee week -- we have a handful of youth who want to go, but we're having trouble finding adults able to spend a week there (it's near Blanding).
• June 25-26 Chapter Backpacking trip through Slide Canyon.
• July 1-5 Freedom Festival -- we're being asked to provide support for the Indian Village and the parade.  This won't be a chapter level activity, but is an option for chapter members.
• July TBD Chapter Elections (probably another maintenance hike on the Slide Canyon Trail as well)
• Aug TBD Chapter Leadership Development Course (may slide to Sep)
• Sep TBD Sector Fellowship (may slide to Aug or Oct)

While the following aren't really scheduled events, they'll show up on the calendar at some point, and are worth knowing about:

• We've adopted the Slide Canyon trail, and need to take 3+ maintenance hikes on it each year.  This year, we're hoping to do 3-4 as a full chapter, and maybe more at the clan/unit level.
• We're trying to establish pre-ordeal and ordeal ceremony teams in the chapter (or maybe the sector). I don't know how often the youth will want to meet for rehearsals/team building, but maybe every month or two at this point.  If you're interested, please let us know.
• We'd also like to spearhead a sector level Brotherhood team.  If you're interested, please let us know.