Mom, is the mail here yet??

One of the perks for joining our Boy Scout troop was a year's subscription to Boy's Life. Of course since my son has been a scout for six years, it seems like we have always had a few dozen copies of this magazine laying around the house.

My son loves reading his new magazine each month. They are filled with great information, games and jokes, safety tips, and true stories of boys his own age battling life in one way or another.

I know this may be a strange thing to like about the magazine, but I would have to include the advertisements. There are ads for candy, shoes, clothing, cereal, kid related websites, and the Air Force.

There are also projects they can do toward merit badges, and in the August 2000 issue there was a section on Jewish Religious Emblems that scouts can earn. These change every month, and the kids get to learn about emblems and badges they may not be able to earn, but their friends might.

I like the "Scouts in Action" comic. They take a true story of a scout and turn them into a comic. For young scouts just learning to read more, the comic adds to their desire to learn, the pictures help demonstrate what happened in the story, and just think what it does for the featured scout. Bet they think it's pretty cool too.

And if you scout loves camping and treking all over the earth, there are sections in Boy's Life that tell about adventures in some of those great places.

One last thing that my son really likes is the features on the professional sports players or other respected members of the community. They tell how they worked hard to get where they are. An inspiration to any young boy.

I will admit, I really like this magazine. It gets my son to read. He learns new things with each month. And it helps him put his scouting experiences into a real world perspective.

Oh, and by the way, both of my girls love to read it too.