Beaver Feaver

So tonight I bust my Beaver virginity and attended my first ever meeting of 'The Colony'.

Seriously.

They call it 'The Colony'.

I had had no previous experience with Beavers, what with being a girl and all that. I'd done Brownies and had a short experience with Guides (before my dad removed me amidst mutterings about the women running it - something to do with lace gloves, Madonna and rumours of prostitution - totally unfounded I'm sure but who knows, odder things happen in village halls regularly. I should know). But never Beavers.

My eldest son is now 6 so he can join and as another boy from his class was doing it and as I think it involves things that he might enjoy (like maps and using Mento mints to explode bottles of coke) I decided to give it a go.

So I phoned the lady in charge up (The Beaver Master so to speak) and she said 'sure, bring him along to the Colony!'.

Seriously? A Colony? Wow - it's like proper Beaver-tastic.

So I took him along but for the first night you have to stay. And as I was staying it meant his younger brother was staying.

Oh dear god. A wanton mini-Beaver.

Things started well although I was quite alarmed by the Rules written out on the wall. From where I was sat I could read 'Beaver's DON'T spit, bite, hit, kick or swear'. Part of me wanted to grab the chalk and add 'or growl' but I was too scared of the ladies in charge. However boredom soon set in and whilst the older one behaved meticulously the younger one set up a chant of 'Stinks like a Beaver, Stinks like a Beaver'.

Sigh.

How can two children born from the same womb be so, erm, bloody different? The older one is quaking in his boots in case he gets anything wrong and the younger one is already aiming to tick off everything on the 'Beaver's DON'T!' list before he even starts.

There is an innocent explanation to his 'phrasing' - it just sounds bad. He is a big fan of the film 'Cars' and of all the dialogue in that film he's taken the joke phrase 'stings like a Beaver' and misheard it into something even worse.....thus 'stinks like a Beaver'. His current 'phrase of the day!'.

He must know it's not a great thing to say because he even asked me 'is Stinks Like a Beaver a bad word? Like when Grandma says bloody?'. Yes I told him. Hmmm he said, with a smile. And thus the game began.....

In an act of great kindness (or desperation - I'm never sure where the line falls myself) the Beaver Master said he could join in with the crafts - and thus I found myself supervising a table full of small boys painting bits of egg box. At this point I was deeply regretting still wearing my work trousers. But not as much as I was several minutes later when, in act of over excited glee,' Stinks Like a Beaver' child ran behind me, stuck his head up my top and yanked my trousers down hard.

Don't ask me why. I don't know why. Like I don't know why he Sudocremed the cat or hid my mum's car aerial in a hedge or shouts 'Boobies' 99 times a day. Just because he can I guess.

Now I've had a stomach bug since Sunday night and after 3 days of living off boiled sweets (with one brave foray into Super Noodles) my trousers are rather on the lose side.

Whoosh.

Down they came.

And in a moment we had a whole new spin on the meaning of a Beaver meeting.

The small boys fell about laughing. I gave a brave ho ho ho and tried to redirect their egg box painting efforts. I don't think the Beaver Master and the Vice Beaver Master noticed. Well maybe they did but they felt it wise not to point out the obvious and inform the rest of the room that I was half undressed. I don't think they do a badge in 'Looking at Half Undressed Ladies'. Yet.

At this point I should probably point out that the Beaver Master and her Deputy aren't actually called that. No. They are in fact called 'Sunshine' and 'Snowflake'. I'm not quite sure what to make of this. They are clearly lovely women very very good at their job but they'd be equally at home on the door outside the local nightclub strong arming drunk men into wheelie bins. If you're going to control a room full of 6-7 year old boys you need a bit of steel in your veins (I found this out when I went to wash my hands and within minutes witnessed an arm wrestle, a deliberate attempt to flood a sink and way too many farting noises). Calling them 'Sunshine' and 'Snowflake' just doesn't fit. I think it might be ironic. Or maybe it's just to mess with the kids' heads and help control them? There's something kind of extra powerful about saying 'sit down, keep your hands to yourself and STOP TALKING or Snowflake here will have to take points off you'.......

Very clever.

Anyway gradually the egg boxes gained antennae and became caterpillars. The boys then had to stretch out sheets of cotton wool and stick them to the painted backs of their caterpillars.

My son had painted his caterpillar red. Blood red. As he sealed a sheet of cotton wool on top of it I was reminded of something. Pondering it for a moment more I was hit by the shock realisaion that my son had made a rather too realistic model of a sanitary towel. A used sanitary towel.

Oh god no!

And then they covered them in cress seeds.....

From one unspeakable sight to another.

Both children have brought their caterpillars home, expect they haven't quite made it into the house. They have displayed them artfully on the dashboard of my car, lodged up against the window.

Other people have bonnet trophies of Jaguars or leaping stallions or soaring stags. I get the 'Bodyform Ultra Cress Covered Two' (without wings).

So if you see a harassed woman driving around wearing tightly belted trousers (or better still a jump suit) with two 'sanitary-protection-like' objects wedged on her dashboard, don't worry, it's only me.

And don't tell Sunshine or Snowflake what I said because I'm actually really scared.....

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