Dave Farrell

To our Wilderness Scouts and Princess families,

I hope this finds you all safe and healthy during this never before seen time.

As you know, we have a proud history. A history filled with genuine purpose to provide fathers and their children the gift of time together and the opportunity to create a lifetime of memories. We offer a variety of activities through campouts, outings, and craft meetings that allow families to participate not only together, but with other families in our community.

In light of a time filled with unprecedented measures, we are pleased to announce a new year is underway for the Park Ridge Wilderness Scouts and Princesses!

Our organization is prepared to adhere to all required health and safety measures to ensure our families can participate in a safe, but meaningful, way throughout the year. We will continue to monitor these guidelines and make changes as necessary.

What will be offered this year?

 Our monthly outings and craft meetings will continue with the appropriate social distancing and face covering requirements.

 Christmas tree sales, which resulted in us giving over $25,000 back to the community last year, will continue with precautions. This is the essence of our organization. We spend invaluable time with our kids, and we give back to the community. We will do everything feasible to keep this tradition moving forward.

A few key changes for our upcoming year

 Campouts: In the interest of safety for all families, we have decided to cancel our fall campouts. We will continue to assess the Winter and Spring campouts and provide updates throughout the year.

 Registration Fees: We understand this year has brought a wide variety of hardship and changes to our community. Therefore, we will be reducing this year’s fee to $60 for our Wilderness families.

We hope you will take this opportunity to join Wilderness Scouts and Princesses and continue its legacy for years to come.

REGISTRATION is now open on our website for the upcoming school year.

Sincerely,

Matt Hachigian

Federation Chief

Park Ridge Wilderness Scouts & Princesses

Iroquois Nation Chief Kevin Wille welcomed new members to the Park Ridge Wilderness Princesses this past Wednesday. Dads and daughters received their first experience with the organization that started with a procession around Maine Park and finished with the 7 Aims around the fire. Smiles and S’mores were served as the evening came to a conclusion.

With the Induction Ceremony, Dads and daughters have taken the first step on an incredible journey together.  They will make new friends and do amazing things that will forever connect them to their tribes and their community.    

Take the first steps and join our organization. Begin your journey together.

The Navajo girls had a great time last week getting in both a craft and outing just before spring break.   

Wubbies, teddy bears, pajamas, and pillow cases… how could Wednesday’s craft meeting not be fun?  The girls designed their own pillow cases, ate popcorn, and drank Kool Aid in a relaxing evening of crafts.  Pajamas were crazy cool but Emily Compton stole the show with pj’s that looked like she was wearing a giant teddy bear.  We loved it! Geoff and Michaela Noth along with Dave (me) and Julia Farrell hosted Wednesday’s pajama party. 

Friday was filled with pizza, pop, NCAA tournament games, and a friendly bowling competition. Adam and Lily had something for everyone. Somehow the Kendals were even able to persuade local celebrity teacher, Mrs. Coleen Dewitt, to join her family including Navajo members Grace and Eric at the party. Good times! 

Dads relaxed and watched basketball tournament games while the girls bowled.  Then at 7:00 p.m. the Brunswick Zone went psychedelic… Lebowski style.  A bowling battle as epic as Roy Munson taking on Kingpin Ernie McCracken ensued.     Alright, so the Big Lebowski and Kingpin references are exaggerations but after two hours of intense bowling action, Abby Sandrik emerged with the ‘Queenpin’ title.  She knocked down 187 pins that night.  Abby earned the Navajo Bowling trophy, which was a Brunszwick Zone bowling pin autographed by the tribe.  Chief Tim Sandrik said that she could proudly display the trophy in the Sandrick’s home, as long as she didn’t use it to hit her brother, Henry.   We wish Henry Sandrik the best of luck.

The night ended and fortunately no one was ‘Munsoned’. 

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A “heated” discussion about which dad is the fastest in the Navajo tribe went on for hours Saturday night until finally a late night camp fire challenge was issued.  “We race in the morning,” said a smiling Bobby Purcell to a chuckling Kevin Wiland.  “I will even spot you five yards.  I know that that I can win,” laughed Bob.  “Bring it!” Kevin responded.  “I was fast as a kid and I am faster than you think.”

The final morning of the Park Ridge Iroquois Nation’s campout, Bobby and Kevin ventured onto to Camp Tecumseh’s wet roads for a one-on-one footrace that Federation Chief Mike Charley would come to describe as “Epic!”  50-meters in distance with bragging rights at stake, the runners met at the start line early in the morning as Navajo dads and daughters paused from loading their cars to go home and instead lined the roads to watch the sprint.

“Go!” shouted Geoff Noth.   Bobby and Kevin bolted.  Bobby was off the line too soon.  False start. Do it again.

The racers quickly reassembled at the start line and readied themselves.  All of the spectators were quiet.  “Go!” Geoff shouted again.  The sprinters exploded off the line displaying surprising speed.   It was neck and neck.  Muscles and lungs burned as the competitors quickly closed the distance to the finish line meter by meter.  At 35-meters, Bobby pulled away in his racing Crocs.

Bobby raised his fist in victory as he crossed the finish line.  The racers and spectators were laughing and smiling as another camp out came to a close.  Bobby walked away with tribal bragging rights and a potential Crocs sponsorship.  It is rumored that the runner-up would assume the role as the Navajo’s chief for the 2019/2020 school year.  Kevin?

 

 This past Monday the Binz family led a Chocolate Fondue party like no other.  There were no warm and delicious chocolate strawberries and pineapple chunks impaled at the end of long thin metal skewers.  Instead the Binz family treated the PR Sauk tribe to dried crickets.  Yes, crickets…  WE ATE BUGS!!!

The boys have been talking and worrying about the cricket eating meeting for at least a week.  The scouts received a reprieve when the original meeting, which was scheduled a week prior, was cancelled due to poor weather conditions.  But now the time had come to eat both dinner and dessert at the same time.

The Binz family started the meeting with a science lesson (Joe Ott approved!) where each dad and son was required to diagram the anatomy of the cricket.  The Binz’s wanted the tribe to know exactly what they were eating.  The tribal members thoroughly appreciated seeing the wings, thorax, antenna and all of the other bug parts that were going into their mouths.  MMMMM… GOOD!

Kudos to biology major Matt Hachigian and his boys Mike and John for correctly identifying all of the cricket body parts.  They earned the first servings of cricket fondue.  Nick Hachigian was missed due to hockey practice.    Dad, Matt, surely brought some tasty bugs home for his son to try.

TIME TO EAT!!!  Chris Binz helped the scouts dip their crickets in chocolate.  After the dip, the boys went to their tables to sit down as the chocolate hardened and they ate their slightly crunchy chocolate dipped crickets.  YUM!  This is not on the menu at the Melting Pot.

“Can I have more?” was actually asked by several of the boys.  Many went back for seconds and thirds… really.  One of the dads commented that plain crickets tasted like sunflower seeds but with a different texture.  The taste was not too far away from that.  Apparently, insects are a great source of protein.  It is not part of the American diet but insects are consumed in parts of Asia and Africa.

The Sauk tribe would like to thank the Binz family for delivering one of the most original and educational craft meetings of all times.

If anyone is interested, Chris said that he was able to order the crickets on Amazon.com.  Enjoy!