Dads, Dirt, and Donuts

This Saturday afternoon we're hosting "Dads, Dirt, and Donuts" (our Spanish translator turned that into "Padres, Plantas, y Pan Dulce" for our Latino families, which is so brilliant it makes my head hurt), a school beautification event that is embarrassingly split down gender lines. But in this case, I'm happy to set political correctness aside because it keeps me from having to dig around in the dirt. Dirt schmirt.

So...the Dads will bring their gardening tools along and plant the area between our Kindergarten playground and the parking lot. And we'll give them some donuts because we're nice like that.

Do you notice something about this event so far? It'll be an excellent community-builder, but as is...it's not raising money! Unable to let a ducat-producing opportunity pass by (if you're keeping up with California budget news, you know that we're still looking at some devastating education cuts), I've added another component. While the Dads do their thing, their parenting partners and kids will paint decorative portrait tiles that will be used to beautify the campus. Our local small business partner in this endeavor is All Fired Up: A Paint Your Own Pottery Place.


All Fired Up is providing all the supplies we need and firing the tiles for an amazingly reasonable price. I've marked the tiles up to turn a little profit of about $500.

I'm liking this type of small fundraiser more and more. They're invariably the kinds of things that the kids love, they require minimum planning, have virtually no overhead, and create a social opportunity for parents. Win, win.