On Wednesday 1 March 2023, 4th Heswall Squirrel Drey was launched with 12 Squirrels attending weekly meetings and taking part in amazing adventures.

The initial ten Squirrels, aged between 4 and 5, three adult leaders and three young leaders were getting into the swing of things and creating routines and regular activities to help our Squirrels feel happy, have fun, learn new things and earn badges along the way.

After Easter, our drey welcomed two new members and twelve is the number we aim to maintain moving forwards. We have also recruited a new uniformed leaders who will potentially be with us for many years to come.

The Summer term was a busy and exciting one! At our regular weekly meetings we played games and enjoyed stories; the highlights of the Summer term:

We planted sunflower and cress seeds, and learnt about how to care for our plants so that they had what they would need to grow (plenty of photos were shared of sunflower plants which were taller than our Squirrels)

We learned about the Monarch’s Coronation – nobody at the meeting (including Red and Mole) had been alive at Queen Elizabeth II’s Coronation, so we watched a video of the event). The crowns we made were very fancy with jewels and ermine as standard. Ten of our members attended the King’s Coronation church parade, looking very smart in their uniforms and behaving impeccably – we were extremely proud of them!

We had some visitors to our meetings too: Izzy came from Scouts to deliver  a lovely session she had planned all about food. The Squirrels tried different fruits and then chose ingredients to make some delicious smoothies. This session earned  Super chef badges for the Squirrels and the You Shape Plan and Lead badges for Izzy. The Squirrel meeting is a great environment for young people to practice their leadership skills and we hope to host more young people for sessions like this in the future.

We also welcomed local superhero, Peter, our local Lollipop Man – he told us all about his superpower (stopping traffic) and as well as learning about road safety the Squirrels got to try on his uniform, hold his sign, hear some stories and play some games to earn their Local Hero’s badge.

In the latter part of the term we got active and out of the hall a few times: 

A Wimbledon themed meeting, playing some tennis games with the kits provided by England Lawn Tennis and then having strawberries & cream and a glass of fizz.

A Sports day at Thornton Hough Village Green, 

Then “Squirrel Splash” at West Kirby Marine Lake was a particular highlight for all! The weather was fantastic and the Squirrels wore their brand new buoyancy aids and had so much fun on and in the water. When it was home time nobody wanted to leave!

As if this wasn’t enough fun, we also enjoyed a number of extra events:

Some of the Squirrels enjoyed taking part in the group camp at Thurstaston, packing a rucksack, pitching a tent, exploring camp and finishing our afternoon making s’mores around the campfire.

There was a West Wirral District day out at Church Farm; exploring the farm and feeding the animals, a tractor ride, playing in the maze and on the park, and eating picnic lunch and ice cream in the sunshine.

At the Group AGM the Squirrels enjoyed the stalls and watching the video and we awarded the “Brilliant” Award to Patrick, a super member of the first 4th Heswall Squirrel Drey, who is now continuing his scouting adventures at Beavers.

At the end of the summer term we also said our farewells to Fraser, as he and his family have moved to New Zealand.

It would be difficult to top the fun we had in the summer, but we have made a great start this term. Two new members were welcomed to keep our number at twelve, we have been in Dawstone Park making “nature faces”, we made a scarecrow for the Harvest Festival parade and wrote about all the things we are grateful for and we have also had a visit to Linghams bookshop and earned our Storytime badge.

It looks like we will be able to award a few Chief Scout Acorn badges before Christmas , so all in all a really positive picture for the still relatively new Squirrel Drey.

Red (4th Heswall Squirrel’s Lead Volunteer, Jane)

If you and your child would like to join our Squirrel Drey at 4th Heswall on a Thursday evening after school please contact us to find out more.

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