St Bartholomews

Primary 1 – Jada

Primary 1/2 – Maya

Primary 2 – Junior

Primary 2/3 – Sean

Primary 4 – Sean Michael

Primary 5 – Shakira

Primary 5/6 – Paige

Primary 7 – Jason

Winning House:  Summerlee

Cool Class Cup: Primary 2/3

The children and staff had an absolutely fantastic time at the Pavilion Theatre pantomime yesterday. The show was jam-packed with amusing story-lines, lively songs, hilarious jokes, stunning special effects, delicious ice cream and lots of general nonsense! Once again, a huge thank you to Mark Millar OBE for funding our special day!

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The boys and girls recently took part in a Christmas art competition organised by the Knights of St Columba. I’m delighted to announce that one of our pupils is a winner and that a trophy will be awarded to them at this morning’s assembly by members of the KSC. What a great achievement!

Please remember that tickets are on sale, priced £1, for this coming Wednesday’s P4-7 Christmas concert as well as for the infant Nativity on Wednesday 16th December. Please also remember to order your St Bart’s tea-towel, priced £3… they’re going fast!

Finally, many of you will have noticed the police presence around the school at the end of the day yesterday. This was in response to complaints from concerned members of the public about unsafe and inconsiderate parking around the school, including in the car-park. The police informed me before they left that they had witnessed and spoken to a number of drivers who were in breach of the Highway Code. Although the police’s aim yesterday afternoon was simply to educate and warn car users, they informed me that they will continue to monitor the situation around St Bartholomew’s and, if necessary, take more serious action.

There will be great excitement as the boys and girls arrive at school this morning because our annual trip to the Pavilion Theatre pantomime has finally arrived! We’ll be boarding the buses around 9.45am and heading off to Glasgow in time for the 11 o’clock performance of ‘Santa Claus is coming to Town’. As always, the trip has been entirely funded by Mark Millar OBE, including the 200+ ice creams! St Bartholomew’s is eternally grateful to Mark for his friendship and generosity; we are one very, very blessed school! Please keep an eye on Twitter to see photographs of our special day.

Do you have a Christmas card you’d like delivered? Help is at hand! Primary 1/2 have set up a Christmas postal service and cards can be posted in the special postbox located in the main foyer. There is a daily collection at 1.15pm.

Have you ordered your St Bart’s tea-towel yet? Demand for these is high, so don’t miss out on the must-have item for Christmas 2015! There’s a possibility we may be ordering another batch, so if you are interested in purchasing more than one tea-towel, please let the office know.

Many thanks, once again, to the parish ‘Pray for our School’ group. This faithful group of parishioners met in the oratory yesterday morning (as they do every month) to pray for the needs of St Bartholomew’s. A group of Primary 7 pupils joined them for tea, a biscuit and a blether afterwards – always a treat for parishioners and children alike!
Our annual trip to the Pavilion Theatre pantomime in Glasgow, kindly funded by Mark Millar OBE, takes place tomorrow. This year’s panto is ‘Santa Claus is coming to Town’, and it’s guaranteed to be a fun-packed day for the children (and staff!). Photographs of our special trip will be posted on Twitter throughout the day. We will be leaving and returning within the normal school day, so there’s no need to make any special arrangements. However, please remember to provide your child with a packed lunch if they are not taking a pack-a-snack from the dinner hall. SCHOOL UNIFORM MUST BE WORN.

Finally, if you didn’t notice the announcement on yesterday’s blog, the Christmas Fayre raised almost £2300… and there’s still more money to come in. Wow!

The current total from the Christmas Fayre stands at a fantastic £2268.10 !!! There are still items to be sold, including the tea-towels, so this amount should rise to around £2500. Many thanks for your support; this money will go directly towards resources and activities for St Bartholomew’s pupils.

We are now into the season of Advent, the four weeks of preparation in the liturgical calendar for the coming of Christ at Christmas. Our Advent wreath has been set up in the main foyer and, as an additional reminder of this holy season, a wreath will also appear on the daily blog, with a candle burning for each week of Advent.

Och aye, we had a pure dead brilliant time at our St Andrew’s Day assembly yesterday afternoon! Check out Twitter for photographs of each class’s Scottish-themed performance.

Tickets go on sale today for the P4-7 Christmas concert (Wednesday 9th December, 1.30pm) and the P1-3 Nativity (Wednesday 16th December, 1.30pm). I am very aware that, with last term’s concert, the Christmas Fayre, the school tea-towel and the various Mary’s Meals fund-raisers, families have been asked to pay out quite a bit of money in recent months. To ease things at this expensive time of year, tickets for our Christmas events will be priced at £1.00.

Primary 1 – Kerry

Primary 1/2 – Corey

Primary 2 – Alex

Primary 2/3 – Stuart

Primary 4 – Michael

Primary 5 – Carly

Primary 5/6 – Jack

Primary 7 – Rhys

Winning House – Drumpellier

Today is the solemnity of St Andrew, patron saint of Scotland. To mark our national day, St Bartholomew’s school community will gather for Mass in the church at 10.00 o’clock this morning and then classes will have fun entertaining each together in the afternoon with Scottish songs, poems and dances. All parents and carers are very welcome to join us for Mass in St Bartholomew’s church.

Despite the inclement weather, the Christmas Fayre was a huge success on Saturday. The money raised will be counted today and the total posted on tomorrow’s blog. Please can I take this opportunity to express my very sincere thanks to Mrs Smile and the fantastic team of parent helpers who prepared and ran this year’s fayre. It is an annual event which involves a massive amount of planning and preparation behind the scenes and it simply would not happen without Mrs Smillie’s expertise and drive and the commitment and hard work of volunteers, including staff. Thank you to everyone who was involved!

It will be a busy day here at St. Bartholomew’s as we set up for tomorrow’s Christmas Fayre. There will be the usual array of stalls and games tomorrow, with something for all ages. Even Santa is making a special visit! Doors open at 10.00am. See you in the morning!