Tigersharks on the Go !!!

November 23, 1996 - Scouting for Food/Clothing - This is our annual food and clothing drive. We will be meeting at Mr. Westfall's house at 8:45 on Saturday morning. Mr. Matthews, Mr. Macala, and Mr. Echternach have all offered their vans to carry what we collect to the drop off site. Hopefully we can fill all 3 vans. We will gather for hot chocolate back at Mr. Westfall's house afterwards.

We had 100% participation from the Tigersharks and were able to collect more than two vans full of food and clothing for the needy. Thanks to all who donated so that others not as fortunate could benefit during the upcoming holidays.

November 25, 1996 - Troop 6 Meeting - We will be making our first visit to a Boy Scout Troop at Great Bridge Baptist Church at 7:30. The meeting will last until 9:00. It is very important that parents attend with us, as this is one of the requirements for our Arrow of Light.

All 8 of us were able to attend and had a great time. Troop 6 seems like a very active Troop. They said they dropped Bungee Jumping from their program after they lost a second Scout that way! We sure hope they were joking.

November 26, 1996 - Pack Meeting - Our monthly Pack meeting will be held at Indian River Middle School at 7:00. Our annual uniform inspection will be conducted at this meeting.

Congratulations to Matt E., Christopher, and Matt W. for receiving perfect inspection scores; and to the entire Tigersharks Patrol for once again outscoring the rest of the Pack. Congratulations also to Michael for earning his Bobcat badge.

December 4, 1996 - Den Meeting - 6:30 Mr. Matthews' house - Matt E. is the Denner for December and will have something great planned for us to do. Christopher is the Assistant Denner and is also responsible for refreshments.

Matt E. did a great job running the meeting. He and Christopher openned the meeting together and then Matt taught everyone what they needed to know to earn their Readyman pin.

December 7, 1996 -Sleepover at the Virginia Marine Science Museum - We will sign in at the Museum between 6:30 and 7:00 pm. We will be touring the museum and spending the night. We get to sleep with REAL tigersharks !!!. Parents are to pick their sons up at 8:00 am on Sunday Morning. Every Webelo that participates will earn his Naturalist activity badge.

Our evening at the VMSM can be summed up in one word. WOW!! Seven Tigersharks and 5 Raptors joined with about 100 other Webelos for a great time. We especially enjoyed petting the sting rays, watching the bats eat worms, and of course seeing the new shark section. Special thanks go out to all the dads that tried to get everyone to sleep before 4:00. The key word is "tried".

December 18, 1996 - Den Meeting - 6:30 Mr. Matthews' house. This is our annual Den Christmas party and the last Den Meeting of 1996. We will be exchanging gifts and making Rice Krispie treats.

Matt E. did an excellent job teaching the den everything they needed in order to earn their Readyman pin. We had a great time exchanging gifts and making Rice Krispie treats. We even made a Rice Krispie treat house! Lets hope it holds together until the Pack meeting !!

December 20, 1996 - Pack Meeting - Our monthly Pack meeting will be held at Indian River Middle School at 7:00. Tigersharks are responsible for the openning.

Only 4 Tigersharks were present but still managed to have a great time. The highlite of the night was when Matt E., Christopher, and Matthew W. received their Arrow of Light. Mr. Westfall and Mr. Echternach finished the evening as "Lords a Leaping" while Mr. Matthews lucked out and got "5 Golden Rings".

January 6, 1997 - Troop 42 Meeting - We will be making our second visit to a Boy Scout Troop. The meeting will be held at Woodland Heights Baptist Church at 7:00. We plan to visit as many troops as possible before making a decision of which one to join.

This was our second visit to a Boy scout Troop meeting. The Raptor patrol joined us this time. We had a great time, once we realized they were just joking about beating us up !!

January 8, 1997 - Den Meeting - 6:30 Mr. Matthews' house - Matt E. will once again lead the den while Mr. Westfall gets Mr. Matthews hooked online so he can see this page.

Thanks to Matt E., everyone that attended this meeting earned their Scientist activity pin and thanks to Mr. Westfall, our Cubmaster (Mr. Matthews) is online.

January 9, 1997 - Magic Show with David Copperfield - Two shows at Chrysler Hall. All proceeds will go to the Tidewater Council. $5.00 will be be returned to Pack 53 for any tickets we help sell.

26 Tickets were bought on behalf of Pack 53 raising $130.00!!

January 11, 1997 - Pinewood Derby - The entire Pack will be racing at Indian River Middle School.

Once again, everyone that attended had a GREAT time ! Congratulations to Tigersharks Matt E. (1st Place in 2nd Year Webelo Division) and Matt W. (3rd Place in 2nd Year Webelo Division).

January 13, 1997 - Troop 48 Meeting - We will be making our third visit to a Boy Scout Troop. The meeting will be held at Great Bridge United Baptist Church at 7:30.

Looks like we are going to have a tough time picking a Troop. All 7 of the Tigersharks in attendance put Troop 48 near the top of their list along with either 6 or 42. Troop 48 really did a great job of making us feel like part of the group. Especially when we beat some of the Patrols in their camp bedding competition.

January 22, 1997 - Den Meeting - 6:30 Mr. Westfall's house - We will be discussing our past and future Troop visitations. Andrew has the refreshments. Christopher will be leading the den as we work towards earning the Engineer activity pin. We will all be missing Mr. Matthews and hoping he recovers from his surgery quickly to rejoin us soon!

Christopher did a wonderful job of leading the den as we moved closer to earning our Engineer Activity Pins. All that is left to earn it is to complete the homework assignment Mr. Westfall gave.

January 28, 1997 - Pack Meeting - First Pack meeting of the new year will be held at Indian River Middle School at 7:00 pm. We will be handing out awards for the Pinewood Derby winners.

February 2, 1997 - Scout Sunday - All Scouts from Pack 53 are encouraged to attend New Life Christian Fellowship in full uniform to show our respect to God and our Chartered Organization.

Pack 53 had a great turnout at NLCF. We had about 20 boys and their families present including three Tigersharks (Matt W., Christopher, and Andrew). We capped off the evening by going to see Heaven's Gates / Hell's Flames. What an awesome drama !!

February 5, 1997 - Den Meeting - 6:30 Mr. Matthews' house - Matt W. will be leading us as we start work on our Geologist Activity pin.

Matt didn't get much time to work on Geologist as we had a lot of other things to go over. Tickets for the upcoming Scoutfest were handed out. Hope to see you there! (Write us if you need a ticket)

February 9, 1997 - Blue and Gold Banquet - We will be touring Fort Monroe for this great event.

February 11, 1997 - Troop 38 Meeting - We will join Troop 38 at Oaklette United Methodist Church at 7:00.

For a number of reasons, only two Tigersharks were able to attend. Unfortunately the others missed one of our best meetings. We may have to reschedule another visit to Troop 38. They invited us to go camping with them!

February 19, 1997 - Den Meeting - 6:30 Mr. Matthews' house

Mr. Westfall tried to cancel the meeting since he didn't have anything planned.....however, thanks to quick thinking on the part of Matt W., Lee, and Christopher we had a great meeting. Matt W. arrainged for Lee to do a karate demonstration and called to let everyone know. Christopher was able to get his house for the location and the rest is history. Nice job guys!

February 25, 1997 - Feller's Cake Bake at Indian River Middle School - Cakes made by Pack 53 Scouts and their Dads will be judged and auctioned off. All cakes have to be made completely by the boys and male helpers. No women or girls are allowed to help. Everything on the cake has to be edible !! Awards wil be presented to the best decorated cakes. All cakes are supposed to stick to the theme of God and Country.

Everyone had a lot of fun as we auctioned off 46 cakes. We raised over $350 for the Pack. Unfortunately, nobody took Mr. Matthews up on his offer. He offered to let whoever bought his cake to hit him in the face with it if they paid $20 for it. Can you believe the cake only sold for $6?...and he bought it!!!

March 5, 1997 - Den Meeting - 6:30 Mr. Matthews' house - We will be electing new Assistant Denner and discussing our past troop visitations.

We began working on making Arrow of Light Progress Trophies. Each of us is making our own real arrow with markings on them showing our progress from Bobcat to Arrow of Light. Andrew was promoted to Denner and Matt E. was elected as Assistant Denner.

March 12, 1997 - Den Meeting - 6:30 Mr. Matthews' house

We continued working on our Arrow of Light Progress Trophies.

March 15, 1997 - Admirals Game - All of Pack 53 will be getting rinkside seats to see our local hockey team (the Hampton Roads Admirals) take on the Richmond Renegades at the Norfolk SCOPE.

March 19, 1997 - Den Meeting - 6:30 Mr. Matthews' house

Everyone has now started working on their Arrow of Light Progress Trophies and a couple are very close to being complete. Next meeting we will be attaching the indian arrow heads.

March 25, 1997 - Pack Meeting - Our monthly Pack meeting will be held at Indian River Middle School at 7:00. Two more Tigersharks will be getting their Webelos badges at this meeting.

April 19-20, 1997 - Pack 53 Spring Family Campout - This will be our first campout ever held as a Pack at Fentress Air Field. The Webelos have been there before for Webeloree.

Two Tigersharks braved the cold weather and had a great time enjoying our last campout with Pack 53. Matt E. and Matt W. joined with the Raptors to put on a great skit.

April 21, 1997 - Troop 48 visitation - We will be visiting Troop 48 again for the Tigersharks that are considering joining this Troop. Matt E., Matt J., Matt W., and Christopher plan on signing with Troop 48 at this meeting.

Looks like we can quit looking for a Troop! 48 is definitely the one for all of the Tigersharks. Everyone has decided to join now rather than wait for the bridging over ceremony next month. We will continue to help Pack 53 grow but will go ahead and start our trail in Boy Scouts immediately. We will return for the formal ceremony next month to say goodbye to everyone.

April 23, 1997 - ULTRAZONE !! - We will be going to play laser tag at Ultrazone. This will be our going away party as we will no longer hold any more Den Meetings.

TOTALLY AWESOME !! We have to do that again. Matt E., Matt W., Christopher, Sean, and Michael had more fun than can be imagined. You have to try it sometime.

April 26-27, 1997 - Elizabeth River District Webeloree - The Tigersharks will try to defend their title of Best Overall Unit won at last year's Webeloree. Regardless of the outcome, we plan to have a great time as this will be our last function together as Webelos.

Well Pack 53 wasn't able to repeat as Best Overall Unit due to some mistakes made by some of the first year Webelos, but we had a great time none the less. The skit performed by the Tigersharks (Matt E., Matt W., Sean, and Andrew) seemed to be the highlight of the campfire. Two Tigersharks (Matt E. and Matt W.) were recognized for finding a large amount of money ($100) and turning it in.

May 10, 1997 - Scoutfest - Join Pack 53 as we get together with Scouts from all over the Tidewater Council to display what Scouting is all about. This year there will be a custom auto show on site along with an attempt to break the world's record for longest line dance. Pack 53 will be displaying Rockets we made for the Space Derby and will allow guests to try them out. Join us if you can. Email us if you need tickets. They are only $2.00 and have lots of great coupons attached. See you there !!

Pack 53 was honored as one of the few units that earned three ribbons at this year's Scoutfest by participating in the parade, running a display booth, and selling tickets. We were the top selling unit in all of the Elizabeth River District with over 700 tickets sold and had the top selling boy in the Council (Matt W. with 330 tickets sold). Everyone had a great time even though we fell short of the line dance record.

May 29, 1997 - Pack Meeting -- This will be our last Pack Meeting. We will have already become active members of a Boy Scout Troop by then and will be attending this meeting for our formal bridging over ceremony. The Pack 53 Tigersharks will cease to exist after this meeting. Well, it's official. we are no longer Tigersharks. We decided our new Patrol name with Troop 48 will be the Dark Knights.

We are now Boy Scouts !!!