Scouts Building Edible Structures...For Pioneer Day

How do you help a bunch of cub scouts celebrate Pioneer Day the week before the state holiday?

You help them build mini-log cabins out of pretzels, frosting, and graham crackers, of course.

Thanks to my wife, I was able to keep the attention of several kids under the age of eleven for the entire meeting. We had the pack meeting business, flag ceremony, reciting of scout motto, oath, law, etc., and after the awards, I talked to the scouts, their parents and siblings, and the other scout leaders about pioneers and how important they were in our state culture. If it weren't for the pioneers, much of the western United Sates would be incredibly different.

The top edible shelter is the one I made. I know I could have taken more time, spread the frosting between each pretzel, you know, to eliminate any huge gaps that would allow wind, rain, and/or slow to creep into my structure. But, I wanted to build something a child could build.

I'd say mission accomplished.

I love watching the kids create on their own. It was bound to happen--some of the kids didn't make anything. They just ate the glob of frosting and snapped up the pretzels. Others explained to me what they made, like the kid who explained that his pretzel and frosting house only had three walls because the missing wall was the door and the extra pretzels on the roof helped to divert rain from those who found shelter underneath the roof pretzels. 

Last year I helped the kids build little covered wagons. This year, log cabins. I wonder what amazing edible, buildable things we'll come up with next year.