In years past, our families have kindly given to a variety of causes: sent school supplies to a school devastated by Hurricane Katrina, provided help to a Houston daycare for homeless children, etc. As we celebrate the 10-year anniversary of our school, we will be focusing our efforts in support of our own parish home that has generously supported us over the years. Taking the place of our annual PTO Christmas Box Project this year we are excited to announce our PTO’s 10 Year Anniversary Service Projects.
Our St. Anthony’s community has over 80 different ministries that serve our parish family and outreach to those in need. Each grade has selected a ministry and will be working to help and support that ministry with its mission. For example, our 8th graders will be holding a fundraiser to raise money for St. Vincent de Paul outreach ministry, our 3rd graders will be making cards and decade rosaries for our Eucharistic ministers to take to the sick and homebound in their EHMC visitation ministry, and our 7th graders are hosting a Christmas lunch to thank the incredible volunteers of our St. Martha’s Society, who host beautiful receptions after every funeral. We are so fortunate to have St. Anthony of Padua as our parish home and we hope our students will appreciate everything and everybody it takes to make SAOP such a vibrant parish. We hope you join us in embracing this project during this very special celebration year for our school.
Service moms from each class will be communicating with you the specifics of your grade's service project. In many cases, we have arranged for someone from the particular ministry to come speak with our students so they have an appreciation of the ministry. With one exception, all the service projects will be completed during school hours. Your service moms may ask for a few volunteers to help in the classroom for a couple of days and may ask for a small donation towards supplies for the projects.
We are calling our SAOPCS families to join us in aDay of Caring for our parish grounds on Saturday, Nov. 13 from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. Our Beautification ministry has been working hard to clean out the medians throughout the church parking lot. You will notice that several of the medians closest to our school look clean and tidy while others are still overgrown and full of weeds. Let us join the dedicated volunteers of this ministry and help beautify our parish grounds. Moms, Dads, and students (5th grade and older) are welcome. Middle school students will earn service hours for this project. All you need to bring is your own garden tools (the type you would use for your own flower beds) and some sturdy garden gloves. Please RSVP to Melony Bergeron at melonyb@gmail.com by Nov. 8. The 5th grade class will be promoting this event during school so we hope everyone gets excited about this opportunity to give back to our parish. Additional dates have tentatively been set for Sat, Dec. 10 and Sat, Jan. 8. Let’s Make a Difference!!!
We are gladly accepting donations for our Day of Caring for our parish grounds. The Beautification ministry will be planting trees along Kuykendahl and various other areas in the front of the church as part of a reforestation requirement by the Woodlands this spring. Funds collected will go toward that effort and additional plantings. If you would like to make a contribution, please return the form on the back of this letter with your donation in an envelope marked “Day of Caring” to the front office.
Let’s make this celebration year a time to give thanks to our home, St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Community.
Thank you in advance for all your efforts,
Elsa Piekielniak
Chair - Anniversary Service Project