Thanksgiving Break

Today was the last day of the Fall Food Drive (we collected 2700 cans TOTAL!) and also the last day of school before Thanksgiving Break. I had a huge exam today, and I'm really glad that's over with. Now I can enjoy my break...even though I won't be relaxing often.

I have a LOT of things planned next week, such as:

1) I'm going to see "New Moon"! Yay! I love Twilight. I have read all of the books!!!

2) We're going Christmas shopping on Monday. Sunny always has to get gifts early.

3) On Tuesday we are putting our plastic Christmas tree up! It's a tradition for us to have our tree up on Thanksgiving.

4) Jane has invited me to a Thanksgiving party at her house on Thursday. It's going to be so much fun. Here's the invitation she gave out:

So that's my schedule. I hope to get as much R&R as possible, but who really can? The holiday season is always the busiest time of the year, according to my family. Happy Thanksgiving! More updates soon :-)

Cali***

PS- Here's a cute picture of Sunny's pups. The black one is Finn, and the tan one is Gus.

Holiday Must-Reads!

Emily and I have collected a grand total of 300 cans so far. Hopefully we'll collect at least 200 more during the next two days. If so, then (if the other groups collected 500, too) we will have met our goal of 2000 cans. I can't wait to see how the people we're donating the cans to will react when we bring them all those delicious food items. Emily and I volunteered to go to the shelter with Mrs. Devon and pass out the cans.

Anyways, the holidays are fast approaching, and winter is nearly here. Emily and I thought it would be fun to give you a list of our top 5 favorite holiday books. Enjoy!

#5: Felicity's Surprise by Valerie Tripp

Felicity is invited to the governor's palace for a Christmas ball. Unfortunately, her mother is too ill to make her a gown. Will Felicity be able to go to the ball and wear a beautiful dress? Find out in Felicity's Surprise!

#4: Little House Christmas Treasury by Laura Ingalls Wilder

A collection of holiday stories from Laura and her family. All stories are actual excerpts from the original Little House on the Prairie book series.

#3: Kirsten's Surprise by Janet Shaw

Kirsten goes with her father to pick up her special trunk. She and her cousins also plan a Swedish surprise!

#2: Molly's Surprise by Valerie Tripp

Molly misses her father a lot. She thinks that this Christmas will be completely different with him away. She's right, but not entirely. A special surprise greets her on Christmas morning that is almost just as good.

#1: On Christmas Eve by Ann M. Martin

Tess really wants to meet Santa, so she decides to stay awake and see him for herself at the time of enchantment, midnight on Christmas Eve.

I hope these summaries gave you a good idea of what these fun, thrilling, and enchanted stories are about. Happy reading! :-)

Cali*** and ^Emily^

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

Yep, the holiday season is fast approaching! Stores are filled with Christmas displays and television is loaded with those cheesy holiday commercials. Even though it's super hectic, I can't help but LOVE the November and December months. They're just so much fun!

Anyway, today was the first day of the Fall Food Drive. We collected approximately 350 cans today; not bad for the first day. Hopefully, we'll get more cans tomorrow! Emily has been opening up to me. She was really shy at the beginning, but now we're actually talking and cooperating together. Today we went to the nearby elementary school and collected cans from there. Then we went around the adjacent neighborhoods and asked for donations. Not many people were home, but those that were donated at least 1 can, which was very helpful of them.

With Thanksgiving a little over a week away, school has been pretty relaxed. We didn't have much homework tonight (YAY!) and tomorrow my friend Molly says there might be none! All the teachers seem to be doing in class is fall and Thanksgiving crafts, recipes, and movies. I do like school, but, well...who doesn't like watching movies more than solving a bunch of algebra problems?

I hope all of you are having a great week! Happy Thanksgiving :-)

Cali***

Give Thanks

With Thanksgiving break right around the corner and then soon after that holiday break, school has been all about appreciating what you have and giving thanks. Yesterday we met yet again in Mrs. Devon's room (with our partners) to discuss our Fall Food Drive campaign. I have to admit Emily doesn't pull much weight in our partnership. All she does is nod at whatever I say, which gets pretty annoying after awhile. It's like I don't even have a partner!

We talked about how many cans we hope to collect, about what charity we'd donate the cans to, and even about how we'd sort the cans after the drive. Once all that was decided, we got to work on the fun part...making posters!

Gwen, the student council historian, takes most of the pictures for the council. Today, though, we changed it up! Kirsten let Gwen model for the poster while she took the picture. Then we uploaded the picture on to Mrs. Devon's laptop, added important information about the drive on to the uploaded picture, and then made a bunch of copies of the poster to hang up throughout the school. We really planned on promoting the drive. Our goal was to collect 2,000 cans, which meant each student needed to bring in at least 2 cans. Most of the student council members were bringing in 10 cans each, because we knew not everyone would actually bring in a can.

Anyway, the poster turned out great. I think Gwen and the rest of the council did a fantastic job designing it.

Hopefully, Emily will try helping out a little more. If not, I'm seriously considering asking Mrs. Devon if I can switch partners. I guess I'll just have to see.

Cali***

Fall Food Drive

Every year, around Thanksgiving, Frosted Meadows School for Girls holds their annual food drive, where students go door to door around their neighborhoods and ask for cans/nonperishable foods to donate to the Fall Food Drive. Every year we donate the cans we receive to families in need and people who are going through rough times. It's a really fun event and I enjoy helping out!

Today was the first meeting. Mrs. Devon, an 8th grade teacher, is managing the drive. She seemed really nice and funny, too. Mrs. Devon had some great ideas for the food drive. Our slogan this year is "A Can You Can Lend To Be A Friend!" This girl Sandy Silvester came up with it. She seemed kind of annoying at the meeting but her slogan was quite catchy, I must admit. After we thought up a slogan and the week we'll be doing the Fall Food Drive (next week), Mrs. Devon paired all of us. Jane and Noelle aren't on Student Council, so they couldn't participate but Kirsten was. I was dreading having her as a partner. She's nice and all, but, well, she can get a tad bit bossy.

Yet, amazingly, I wasn't paired with Kirsten. My partner was this little red haired girl named Emily Bennett. Emily looked shy, so I was guessing she wouldn't be bossy like Kirsten, which was a major relief in my opinion. We chatted for a while about where we planned to ask for cans and when we should meet up. Emily didn't do much, except nod or say "Mmm-hmm" here and there. Although, I was excited about having her as a partner, I couldn't help but feel like I was doing all the work and making all the decisions.

Tomorrow night I'm going over to Emily's dormitory so we can discuss some more. I'm hoping she'll be a little more talkative and helpful tomorrow, but we'll have to see.

Anyways, the meeting went really great. At the end Mrs. Devon passed out sugar cookies shaped like autumn leaves and everyone had a grand old time. I think we're going to have a great Fall Food Drive this year!

Cali***

PS- Emily's person is Sunny's sister, Marigold.