Finals on the Holiday Gifts

The word came from the parent committee that since not every class collected the same way for Miss Marta and the floater teachers, they would take care of gifts for them ($50 AmEx card for Miss Marta and $20 movie gift certificates for the floater teachers), and that we should put whatever we collected towards our teachers. I decided to even it out and put $110 in Candice and Krystin's envelopes, and $65 in Farah's. The cards all say "Happy Holidays from the 3's!"
Sadie and I got cinnamon rolls baked (you put enough cheese sticks in that child and she'll calm down and do anything), so we're sticking some of those in with our holiday cards tomorrow morning. Hope you'll add a card or something too! :)

Holiday Gifts Update

So far I have three large baskets ($22 from Michael's craft store), and three poinsettia plants ($18 from Stop and Shop). There's more room in the basket on the left than shows in the picture! Please feel free to add something personal (card, goodies, whatever) from your family to the baskets on Tuesday morning.

Our total gift fund for our teachers is $300, minus $40 for the baskets and plants, so we have $260 to work with.

I'll head over to the bank on Monday and get some nice crisp new bills -- $100 each for Krystin and Candace, and $60 for Farah to tuck inside the cards from the class.

I haven't passed on our contribution to the parent committee yet as I haven't heard back from them on whom I'm supposed to give it to -- will keep you posted on that.

Fall Fund Update

Fall Gift fund total so far: $312 (for Krystin, Candace and Farah, plus the class contribution to the parent fund for Miss Marta and the other staff). For our three, that works out to $120 each for Krystin and Candace, and $60 for Farah, and $12 to give to the overall fund.

Class slush fund: $44

Anyone who hasn't contributed and would like to, please tuck your contribution in the manila envelope in Sadie's mailbox in the room. What do you all think about aiming for giving the gifts on Pajama Party Day -- the last Tuesday before the vacation? If you think that day will be too crazy, maybe we could shoot for that Wednesday? To make this as easy as possible, I'm thinking about putting baskets or gift bags for each of them on top of the cubbies with the envelope and note saying it is from the class, maybe a plant also? If you'd like to tuck a personal card or note in for each of them, please do so (or cookies, a picture from your child, or whatever else you want to manage ... I'm going to aim for baking something but it depends on how crazy life is).

Any other ideas that sound better? I'm up for just about anything that's relatively easy and nice for them.

Cameras and Bookfair

Cui sent an email saying that we now have a digital camera and a photo printer for each campus, so all the teachers will be able to print pics of the kids on-site now!
This came from the candle fundraiser money in the budget.

Check in the bookfair area for the list of books that the teachers have requested. I haven't made it down there yet, but am planning to this afternoon.

Santa Breakfast: Help Needed!

Santa Breakfast update! This is a fun event paid for by the Board, and organized by the parents. Dec. 8, 9-11 am, in the Hitchcock Room at St Mary's on Greenwich Avenue. Leave your RSVP in the envelope by Sue's desk!

FYI to all: these are the kinds of volunteer opportunities we have open at the Santa Breakfast. Cui is collecting volunteers for this, so if you would like to help, send her an email and tell her what you'd like to help with: cui-zhu.lei@zurichna.com

1) Set-up (tables, chairs, food, drinks, decorations) from 8AM.
2) Final Clean-up
3) (2 to 3 people) Shopping for food, drinks, from Costco on Friday 12/7-
sometime in the afternoon - with Margaret Verrico)
4) Pick-up 2 Fruit Salad/Tray from local store in the morning of 12/8
5) 1 person every 30 minutes as Greeters (name tags, "hello", etc.) and
encourage plant sales (4 people)
7) 1 Photographer with Santa (polaroid pictures) every 30 minutes (9:30am
to 11am, 3 people)
8) 1 Santa/Photographer's Helper every 30 minutes (3 people)- we might
need 2 - to organize line for children, etc.
9) 2 Refreshers (clean-up, refilling food, drinks, etc)every hour (4
people) or every 1/2 hour.

Bookfair Reminder

Bookfair is this coming week! Keep an eye out for the teacher request list -- hopefully that will get posted quickly so if anyone wants to contribute a book to the classroom it will be easy to do.

Fall Fund update

Fall Fund contributions so far: $260

Slush fund for the classroom: $40

Thanks to everyone who's contributed so far!

Updates on Events

Book Fair (I'll see if I can get a flyer to scan and post here-- still working on that)
- Nov 26-30
- We should have some sort of class wish list posted in the room or down at the bookfair. I'll get the list posted here as well, if you'd like to contribute a book to the classroom library.
- If anyone can help set up on Saturday 11/24, please RSVP (on flyer)
- Late night Wed 11/28 until 7:00 ** RSVP needed. (Form on flyer). This needs to be returned by 11/20 so we can reserve staff

Santa Breakfast - Parents run this, and the Board sponsors it
- December 8 from 9-11 am
- Continental breakfast plus visit from Santa and Entertainer (same great guy as last year!)
- Flyer will be sent home later in November, but poster will be hung throughout the school shortly
- Volunteers needed for set up and clean up.
- RSVP sheets will be in each classroom and on the front post
**Bring your cameras - we could use some pictures for the yearbook!

Plant Sale
- Flyers will be sent out the week of the 19th - definitely before Thanksgiving.
- Orders will be due by 11/30

Monthly Teacher Appreciation
- Coffee and donuts were provided to the teachers on 11/9. We'll need to pick a month to do that for the teachers (the parent committee will fund, we just need to get a couple volunteers to pick up the items, bring in and set up in the teacher room, and turn in receipts).

Fall Fund Update

Fall Gift Fund so far: $78 (11/13)

Slush fund so far: $24 (11/13) (for classroom needs/teacher requests)

I've left a manila envelope in Sadie's mailbox for contributions. Please contribute whatever you feel is appropriate. If you'd rather do your own thing for teacher gifts, please don't feel this is required -- it's only an attempt to make this easier for all.

You should have received flyers for the Bookfair and the Santa Breakfast last week. I'll send email reminders before the events, and I'd like to encourage everyone to participate in both! We should have a wish list for the classroom at some point during the Bookfair, and I will try to get that posted online here as soon as I see it for those who would like that.

Madhunika had some suggestions for other uses for the blog -- perhaps using it for announcements or as a bulletin board for playdates. Please feel free to comment and/or suggest other uses for this space!

Fall/Winter Fund Updates

So far the response is very positive -- we had a suggestion of getting the teachers gift certificates (maybe the AmEx ones that they could use anywhere?).

I'll post a list of requests from the teachers as I get them.