It's Christmas in our new home!

Tomorrow is December 1st!  Wow has this year flown by.  We had an terrific open house in November.  The parents were very excited about what St. Joseph School had to offer.  The teachers were teaching and the Student Council served as hosts and everyone seemed to be very happy.  It was a great night and hopefully help parents make the decision to send their child to STJ.

We are preparing for Christmas now.  The school is all decorated and the students are getting very excited.  Our basketball teams are in full swing and the ski program is getting organized as I write.  The cheerleaders are working hard on their sidelines and plan on cheering at this week's varsity game.

We have all kinds of events planned for this month.  Our Student Council is very busy.  Last month they sponsored an "all the fixin's" food drive.  We have traditionslly collected turkerys but had nowhere to store them this year, so they decided to have a food drive to provide all the other foods served on Thanksgiving.  Mrs. Hamel brought box after box of food to the Food Bank. 

They are also sponsoring a pajama drive in conjunction with Scholastic Books.  Every pair of pajamas we collect will be paired up with an age appropriate book to donate. 

The Council is meeting this week to plan the Christmas Basket Raffle.  They still have to decide what charity will benefit.

So busy--- but we are always reminded --- the reason for the season.  Jesus is why we are here,  why we celebrate and what this is all about.  We are proud to have as our patron, the man God felt was worthy of raising our Savior. 

Have a great season --- will be back soon!

Open House!

We just had our first dance and it was terrific.  About 80% of the school attended and it looked like most of the kids had a very good time.  Plans for the Christmas dance in under way already. 

We are in the throws of planning our open house --- November 18th!  Please pass the word on to anyone who might have a teenager in the family.  Let's let the world know about the great experience you can have at STJ.  It all starts in the community center at 7:00 PM.

We just finished our Student Council elections.  Mike Salvato is our new president, Will Bemiss our new vice-president.  They are very excited about getting to work.  It looks to be a very good Student Council year.

Alumi, you know that you are welcome anytime.  Be on the lookout for our annual appeal.  You may recognize some of the people on the front!

New Sign!

Our new sign is up outside the building!  St. Joseph has a beautiful garden thanks to the Duffleys!  Our art classes have been very busy!  Where can you see all of this!  Yes, you can drive by or stop by (and you are more than welcome anytime) but you can see them on our website (http://www.stjoesjrhs.org/).  Mr. Powell has added some wonderful new pictures to our home page.  Please check them out --- it'll make Mr. Powell feel good!

The First Month In Our New Home

It's hard to believe we have only been here a month!   The St. Anthony teachers have been great, the lunch ladies are awesome and Mr. Bergeron has been wonderful.  The students, of course, have just fallen into a new school as we would expect students to do.  The most common sentence --- "It even looks like St. Joe's!" 

We are all pretty settled in.  Our sports teams are off and running, in fact we have more students playing soccer this year than last year.  It must be the beautiful ORANGE jerseys that are inspiring them.

Classes are going very well and we are now gearing up for our first fundraiser --- PIES.   They will be coming in in early November, just in time for the holidays.  This is perfect for those of us who believe that if someone does it better (like Betty Crocker) why do it yourself?

We are all looking forward to a beautiful fall.  The cooler weather is a blessing!

We're in!!

We're in!  Last week was all about moving.  Now that all the furniture is in and the lockers are in, we are feeling like a junior high.  The teachers are busy opening boxes and decorating their new rooms.  It looks great and we can't believe that we are only one week away from open house --- WOW.

As we get ready for a new year, we like to remember some of the students who will be making a splash in high school.  Of course, we are very proud of the STJ graduates who were valedictiorians --- John and James Strampfer (Trinity) and Ariana Vailas (Central).  What an accomplishment.  Best of luck and best wishes to them and all the class of 2006 as they head to college.

We also wish the best to Cam Boucher (student council president -- Central) and Ryan and Abby Mitchell ( student council president and vice president --- Trinity).   We're sure they will do a great job as all three did a great job at St. Joe's. 

One week to go --- rest up, we have a great year ahead!

The way things look

Here are some photos of what's happening at our new home. In a lot of places, St. Anthony's is looking pretty messy. Rooms have been cleared of desks and tables and the gym is like a mountain range of stacked furniture! All the same, you can definitely see the work that is being done to get the school in great shape for when students arrive later this month. Take a look at what's happening in these pictures. 

Some rooms are getting a total rehab, like these classrooms in the lower level by the gym. 

That's a lot of stuff! Desks and other classroom necessities will be heading back into classrooms once they're ready to go. Don't worry! They're taking care not to damage the gym floor. 

A classroom after a fresh wax and paint job. 

Some places are looking pretty spiffy already!

We're getting some great help! Thanks to everyone for helping make the building look awesome!

Back from vacation and on the move!

Slowly but surely the faculty and staff are coming back from a couple of weeks of vacation.  Most of the building is packed and it looks like we will be moving sooner than expected!  We will be moving the first week of August, so everyone is finishing up.

It will be great to be in earlier so we can have more time to make all our classrooms pretty.  The rooms have all be painted and they look great.  The office is sage green and I am thrilled.  Everyone will have to come to the open house in August to see!  (More about this to come.)

Mr. Bergeron and I have been hammering out the nuts and bolts items:  schedule, drop off, pick up, sports, lunch program, etc.  Everyone will be getting a letter soon with all these details.

Homeroom letters will be going out in the next couple of weeks.  It will be fun for the students to try and figure out who their homeroom teacher will be since they have no idea who is in what room!  What a mystery..........

Back to work.  Have to finish packing the office so I can go clogging.  Have a good week!