7th grade is officially wrapped up… and so is Boy Scouts for the summer.
School honestly ended with a bit of a whimper. There were no huge celebrations or dramatic movie-style moments on the last day. But at home? We celebrated anyway.
Iyan passed all his classes and made the A/B Honor Roll, which definitely deserved some recognition!
Boy Scouts, however, ended on a much more exciting note.
Iyan earned five merit badges and ranked up to First Class Scout.
But the truly shocking part?
I actually got his Scout shirt fully decorated in time for the Court of Honor.
For those of you unfamiliar with Scouts, every time a Scout earns a merit badge, rank, or special award, they receive another patch to add to either their shirt or sash. Over the years, those patches can pile up quickly.
And apparently my organizational system for these patches was… tossing them into the top drawer of Iyan’s dresser and hoping for the best needed to be revised.
Being the seamstress that I am, none of his patches had ever made it onto his shirt. He still had his Cub Scout AOL patch attached, but I had never added any of his Boy Scout ranks. Honestly, he looked like he had barely participated.
So last weekend, I finally decided to bite the bullet.
Iyan and I headed to the Scout Shop where I bought:
- a new shirt
- a sash
- and apparently… a new level of responsibility
Since he was close to outgrowing his old shirt anyway, the sash seemed like the smarter option long-term — especially if he keeps progressing toward Eagle Scout.
The Scout working at the store gave me a life-changing tip:
fabric glue and velcro.
Because apparently they charge $4 per patch to sew them on.
Yikes.
So naturally, I immediately went to the store, bought fabric glue and velcro, and started gluing patches onto that sash like my life depended on it. I velcroed on the rank badge since if all goes well
And honestly?
You should have seen the other Scouts when Iyan walked into the Court of Honor wearing a fully decorated sash and updated shirt.
I felt like the star of the event. 😂
Very few of the boys have all of their patches, ranks, and awards attached. It really is hard to keep up with everything.
But now that Iyan is a First Class Scout, I figured it was time we started setting a proper example for the younger Scouts… and also stopped risking the loss of rank emblems and patches in the black hole otherwise known as his dresser drawer.
To top it all off, after the Court of Honor I even came home and added the new patches and rank from that night.
Look at me being proactive for once.
Scout Camp… here we come!
Please tell me I’m not the only parent with a random pile of patches stuffed in a drawer somewhere.
With love & glitter,
Valerie ✨
Feathers and Phases 