Happy December MES family members! I hope the break at the end of November gave you and your kids an opportunity to enjoy each other while giving thanks as a family. We at MES have a lot to be thankful for! The energy in the building is growing with the excitement that comes this time of year. We have a lot happening prior to December 16, our last day of the semester.

I hope you are making plans to attend the Family Holiday Movie Night TONIGHT, sponsored by our MES PTO. The fun begins at 6:30 and will last about an hour. We'll be watching two short movies entitled Prep and Landing (episodes 1 and 2). There will be free popcorn and bottles of water, and lots of laughter so bring your lawn chairs and blankets to the gym and enjoy the fun beginning at 6:30 this evening!

Thank you to all of you who helped your students sell cookie dough during our recent fund raiser. It was a HUGE success! We sold a total of 1525 tubs this year which is about 250 more than we did last year. In fact, I just received confirmation this morning that all 5,134 pounds of cookie dough have shipped from the warehouse and are on their way to Maize Elementary, so now it's time to talk about deliveries. We are having a pick-up event this Wednesday, Dec. 7 from 3:30-8:00 in the gym, and it is very important that everyone picks up their orders that night. You don't have to have payment to pick up the orders, but you are welcome to make payment if you're ready to. You can send the payments to school with your students, but please be sure to mark the payment with your student's name, who the payment is from, and the amount. We will then cross-reference everything to make sure we have record of the payment. The deadline for payments is December 14. Feel free to call the office with any questions you might have - 722-8230.

Our annual Snowed In family reading and math night is fast approaching and you won't want to miss it, so please mark your calendars for the evening of January 26! Our staff is making plans for another great evening filled with fun activities for your family to enjoy. It is our staff's hope that MES families will participate in a night of fun with their children, and will also walk away with useful make-it-and-take-it activities for the kids.   In addition to the educational fun, we will be having an optional pizza dinner again this year, and will also have a silent auction for baskets that participating classrooms will be organizing. We're changing the bidding process this year to a ticket system to be more inclusive and to get more people involved. As we have done each year, all proceeds from the auction will go directly back to participating classrooms. More information about the auction and the pizza dinner will be coming home with your students in the days to come.

I'm excited about making a positive push to December 16 and then welcoming our students to the New Year on January 3, 2017! Blessings to you and your family throughout this holiday season, and thank you for partnering with us and being part of the MES family!