Congratulations to the winners of our drawings:

• Martin Corpus – Red Gift Basket
• Donna Hodgson – Visa Gift Certficate
• Lisa Hampsten – Backpack

We want to again thank everyone who helped to make the Christmas season at St. Martin’s so wonderful this year. Special thanks go out to:

• The Edward Lozano family and Gavotto family for their efforts and enthusiasm in helping to organize St. Martin’s participation in the Granada Hills Christmas Parade.
• Mrs. Laura Hernadez and Mrs. Ellen Bobertz for their help with Santa’s Secret Shop.
• Mrs. Haller, Mrs. Slusser, all the bakers, and the Gavotto family for all of their help with the Christmas Concert.
• Everyone who contributed to our gift drive for Hillsides Home for Abused and Neglected Children.
• Parishioners of St. Martin’s Church for their donation of free childcare for St. Martin’s families on December 18th.

Enjoy the rest of your Christmas break and we look forward to seeing you back in school on Tuesday, January 3, 2012!

It was wonderful to see so many of our families at our St. Martin’s Day celebration. Thank you for attending. We were also delighted to have a number of veterans attend our Veterans’ service. Articles on the service have appeared in the Daily News and Episcopal news and photos from the service are available in a slide show in our Veterans Service 2011 post. Ernie Napper, 22 year Marine Corps (retired) spoke at the service, as did Jack Knight from Operation Gratitude. Each class gave a special performance and then Jose Martinez, representing Councilman Zine’s office presented the school with a Certificate of Recognition thanking us for our work honoring veterans. After the service, everyone went to the flagpole for the flag retreat and to hear Kindergarten sing “God Bless America.” As the Daily News said “the children of St. Martin’s certainly learned that Veterans Day is not just a day off from school”.

On the Monday before Thanksgiving, we held our all school Thanksgiving service and on Tuesday the students enjoyed Friendship Breakfast with other classes.

Upcoming Events:

Santa’s Secret Shop: November 30th-December 1st
Volunteers are needed to help the children shop and to wrap purchases made by the children. Fill out the Santa’s Secret Shop form or contact the school office if you can help!

Granada Hills Christmas Parade: Sunday, December 4th
Please plan to participate in this great event for our school! Fill our our Christmas Parade Volunteer form to let us know how you plan on participating. Invite friends and family to line the parade route and cheer us on! This is a great opportunity for your children to march in a Christmas parade or cheer their school on. Students should wear either their school uniform, St. Martin’s sports uniform or cheer uniform if they are marching and representing the school. For more details, check out Join The Parade Info!

December Family Service: Sunday, December 11th at 10am
The date of the family service has changed so that it does not conflict with the Christmas parade. This service will have plenty of opportunities for the children to participate by singing, reading or acting and Preschool & Kindergarten are going to sing for us!

Christmas Shows: December 14th at 10am & December 15th at 7pm
We are again presenting our Christmas Show at no charge in St. Martin’s Church. In order to allow everyone an opportunity to see the show we will be doing two shows:

• Wednesday, December 14 at 10am: This is our preview show for grandparents, parishioners and other friends.
• Thursday, December 15th at 7pm: This show is for St. Martin’s parents and siblings.

We are extremely grateful for the twenty refurbished Dell computers donated to the school by one of our families who wish to remain anonymous. Our thanks also goes out to Mr. Tito Hernandez for helping to install them. The children are delighted and we are so pleased with these exciting changes that will enhance their learning experience. We are still looking for some flat screen monitors to replace the more bulky monitors we currently have. Please let us know if you or anyone that you know can donate any they are no longer using.

Thank you to everyone who has been shopping and supporting one or more of our fundraisers.

NEW: DVD and BLU-RAY Movies
When you buy DVD and Blu-Ray movies through Fundertainment, up to 50% of the purchase price comes back to the school! Simply head over to http://www.fundertainment.com/stmartinsschool/ and:

• Register online for a Fundertainment ID# or download and fill out the Fundertainment form and fax it to (888) 245-7486 to create your account.
• Spread the news to your family and friends and make sure to tell them your Fundertainment ID# so that their orders will be properly credited to you and shipped to the school. Remember to tell them that orders will be shipped to the school and ordering deadlines are the 1st & 15th of each month.
• Pick up order from the school twice a month (about two weeks after orders are placed) and deliver any orders made by family and friends.

Fundertainment has hundreds of titles available in many different categories including: Children’s, Action, New Releases and more! This fundraiser will run all year long and each month there are new releases and special offers. Hundreds of titles are available!

Order from Fundertainment by November 15th to guarantee delivery by Christmas!

Gift Cards
Buy your gift cards through the scrip program at school and a percentage of the purchase price is refunded to the school. Most major stores are available including: Toys R Us, Target, Macy’s, JC Penney, as well as restaurants, iTunes, Home Depot, See’s Candy, gas (Exxon, ARCO & more) and grocery stores (Vons, Whole Foods & more) to name just a few. Download the order form, fill it out and return it to the office for processing. Orders placed by 10am on Mondays typically arrive by the end of the same week. Friends and family can order these cards too!

Last Gift Card Order Date Before Christmas – Monday, December 5th!

ShopSMART (and receive credits to your tuition account!)
Register your Ralphs and Vons cards and use them at check out, register your credit cards and dine out at selected restaurants or shop on-line at major stores in the eScrip Mall and you will receive a credit to your tuition account for 50% of the income that the school receives from your purchases.

Target REDCard
Sign up for a Target REDCard and you instantly get a 5% discount on your total purchase and 1% of your purchases come back to St. Martin’s! Here’s all you need to do:

• Apply for either a Target Credit Card or a Target Debit card at any Target store or by mail
• Link your REDCard to St. Martin’s through the Take Charge of Education Program. Search for St. Martin’s School by zip code (91306) or our Target School ID (3336)

NOTE: The Target REDCard is not part of the ShopSMART program.

BookFair
Didn’t get to the BookFair or forgot to buy for someone? You, friends and family members can shop online until November 18th and Scholastic dollars will still come back to the school. We can then use those dollars to buy new books and other items for the library. Simply head over to Scholastic and shop our virtual Book Fair! Online orders will be shipped for free to the school after November 18th.

Virtual BookFair orders must be placed by November 18th!

Thank you so much for your support! Remember, each time you shop in one of the above ways, you earn much needed funds for our school!

H A P P Y   S H O P P I N G !

Bishop Mary Glasspool and Serena Beeks, Director of the Diocesan Commission on Schools visited St. Martin’s last week. We were honored to have them here and they were extremely impressed with both the school and the students. The children were incredibly polite and well behaved – they made us very proud indeed!

The children are looking forward to Halloween! Our parade starts at 2pm on Monday, October 31st, and class parties follow at 2:15pm. Please remember – no blood, gore, masks or weapons, so that our younger students do not get frightened.

Coming up is our St. Martin’s Day celebration on Sunday, November 6 at 10am. Please return the form so that we can plan accordingly.  The children have been practicing enthusiastically so please bring them along so that they can join their friends.

Our Scholastic Book Fair will take place November 7th-10th with a special family event on November 6 following the St. Martin’s Day service. This year the theme is “To the Book Fair and Beyond – Reading is Out of this World!”. If you would like to help with the Book Fair please complete and return the sign up form by Friday, October 27th.

Please plan to attend our Veterans’ Day Chapel on Wednesday, November 9th, at 8:30am and invite any Veterans that you know to join us. Ernie Napper, 22 year Marine Corps. (retired) will be our guest speaker in chapel and all Veterans present will be honored at the Flag Retreat ceremony following the service.

Our Middle School has elected their Student Council. We thank them for taking on these duties and wish them a successful year.

We have exciting news coming up about our Computer Lab……stay tuned! In the meantime, if you have any flat screen monitors that you no longer need, please donate them to the school.

Our volunteers, as always, are doing an awesome job and are brightening up our days by being on campus. If you have not returned the Volunteer Opportunities form, please take a moment to complete it online. Special thanks to those of you who volunteered to be Room Parents! Please give your child’s Room Parent support when he/she asks for it.

Our after school sports program is going well and our young athletes are training hard and representing our school outstandingly. Our thanks to Coach Amy and Coach Pollock for all their efforts and also thanks to the parents who are driving and cheering our teams on at their games. Please remember to turn in photos that you take at the games for the yearbook. Special thanks to Evan Jackson for donating our after school sports uniforms this year!  Go Bulldogs!!!

Snack Shop is back!!! This will take place on Wednesdays and home game days. Our thanks to Coach Amy and the 8th Grade class for running it. Proceeds will fund 8th Grade graduation activities.

Sadly our school cannot survive on tuition income alone and we are dependent on your support of our fundraisers as far as your financial situation will allow. We try wherever possible to hold fundraisers that are requested by you (such as cookie dough) or are items you are likely to purchase anyway, but by purchasing them through the school you allow us to benefit. This is the case with our upcoming Fundertainment fundraiser, whereby you can purchase DVDs on line that you would normally buy in stores, however almost half of what you pay is returned to the school. Further details will follow next week, however please remember this fundraiser when shopping for the holidays as it has the potential to be a big money maker for the school.  Please encourage friends and family members to participate also.

No doubt the children have told you that they can wear free dress on their birthday this year. If their birthday falls on a Friday (normal free dress day) they can wear it on the following Monday. They seem to prefer this to getting a pencil.

We like to pass on information if our students are doing something for the community and to that end we would like to wish 1st Graders Aaron and Griffin much success with their walk in aid of Pancreatic Cancer Research on October 30th.

We also like to keep you informed of community involvement by our teachers. Recently our teachers donated scarves to Operation Gratitude and we received a wonderful thank you letter from them earlier this month.

The year continues to go well and your children are working hard, having fun and making us proud!

Our final Fall Fundraiser turn-in day is this Tuesday, October 4th. The most popular prizes are the Bingo party, the air guitar, the money & prize machine and Burger King lunch with two friends. Don’t forget that you and family and friends can also order online. Make sure that you bring in your confirmation receipt so that your child is credited with the orders. Have family & friends email you their receipts also.

Our thanks to everyone who has already completed the Volunteer Opportunities form and returned it to the office. If you have not done so, you may fill this out online instead of turning your form in to the office.

Don’t forget that October 5th is Photo Day! All children should come to school in school uniform for their pictures. Please call the office if you are available to help on photo day from 8:30am until midday.

October means Halloween and our annual Halloween parade will take place at 2pm on Monday, October 31st followed by parties at 2:15pm. Please remember, no blood, gore, masks or weapons are allowed in the parade or at the parties. If you’re still looking for costumes, check out our Halloween Costume Closet.

Remember to register your Ralphs, Vons and credit cards for ShopSmart and remind your family and friends to sign up too. 50% of the money received by St. Martin’s from your registered cards will be credited to your tuition account and 50% goes directly to St. Martin’s. Also, please bring any Fresh and Easy receipts to the school office – they will donate $1 to the school for every $20 you spend at their store.