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The construction Of the hall! As witnessed by CS19 Follow our Journey in weekly posts

Term 2 Week 8 June 20th– June 24th 2011

Guess who’s still here helping out, way above and beyond the call of duty…yep, Geoff The Builder…and he still manages to find time to coach the rugby league team at lunchtimes too.

The floor-guys arrived this week. They are getting the floor ready for us to use. They need to screw all the wooden panels down carefully, put putty into the holes and then sand everything really smooth so that they can paint it with a special sealant. They had a sanding machine that looked like a giant vacuum cleaner and it was very noisy.

There were some interesting looking tins of chemicals out the back. This is the special paint they will be using for the floor. The hazard sticker looks great!

We think it might be ready by next week and Ms Marino is organising a special blessing of the hall by Nanny Ma. This is getting exciting now!

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Term 2 Week 7 June 13th– June 17th 2011

We were amazed to see Super- Builder Geoff voluntarily back on deck (that’s called a pun!) again this week, still working tirelessly on the constructing the deck, supported by Craig and his team of helpers.

Inside, the electricians were finishing off bits and pieces and there is now power and lights working in the hall.

Maybe, just maybe, we are not too far away from getting to use it for real.

Term 2 Week 6 June 6th– June 10th 2011

Well, once again the Westmere community has rallied around and got together to get us out of a tight spot. Some enthusiastic parents came in and donated their time, energy, expertise and materials to start fixing up the shambles around the outside of the hall. Led by Geoff and Craig they have performed a near miracle to get the deck started. An interesting way to celebrate the Queen’s birthday.

They dug, measured, concreted, sawed, nailed and braved the swamp monsters to get the whole hall project back on track and heading towards completion.

You guys and girls are amazing!

Term 2 Week 5 May 30th – June 3rd 2011

We risked the swamp and managed to get into the hall for some photos. The builders have put some steel mesh things onto the beams on the ceiling. The electricians will be attaching the lights to these.

Apparently we can’t use the hall until there is a deck built around the outside…but the builders have all gone… this could be a problem…

Term 2 Week 4 May 23rd – May 27th 2011 Still not much going on. There were some “issues” with the drainage and diggers and stuff which has created The Great Westmere Bog. This is proving to be a challenge for the area around the hall and some of the grass on the field. We have decided not to venture too close to the hall for photos because we might get swallowed up by the quick-sand!

Term 2 Week 3 May 16th – May 20th 2011 It’s been very quiet in the building site this week. The painters have started…we think, but there doesn’t seem to be much else happening. media type="custom" key="9862249"

Term 2 Week 2

May 9th – May 13th 2011

As predicted last week, assemblies are cold and we now have them over the intercom in our classrooms.

The gib-stoppers finished up and the painters returned to start painting the inside of the walls. There is still no power in the hall yet but it will probably be connected up when they put the wires onto the switches properly.

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Term 2 Week 1 May 2nd – May 6th 2011

As soon as we came back to school, they put the orange fence back up, so maybe the hall isn’t quite ready for us yet.

The little yellow digger came back (hmmm…sounds like a book title!) and did some more digging around the outside of the hall but then it got stuck.

The gib-stopper guys carried on making the inside all smooth and ready for painting. They used a machine which looked like a giant egg beater to mix the paste stuff that they were putting onto the joins on the walls.

Assemblies could be quite cold if we have to stay outside for much longer. media type="custom" key="9862225"

Term 1 Easter Holidays

Apr 18th – Apr 29th 2011

The most noticeable thing to happen while we were away in the holidays scoffing Easter Eggs and annoying our parents was that the builders took down the lovely orange fence from the front part of the hall. There are still some big holes where the drains are being put in so we will still have to be careful when we’re playing ball nearby.

The builders are still working on the Gib-board stuff for the inside walls and ceiling. They have covered the floor with a giant blue tarpaulin…it looks like a big swimming pool again! We are wondering why they have done this…maybe to protect the floor from something? After the gib was nailed to the walls, some other guys called “stoppers” came in. Their job is to cover up all the joins and nail holes in the gib-board. They used tape and a special mixture of paste to make it smooth. They put a few layers on and had to sand it between each layer to make sure it is smooth enough to be painted later on.

Some other builders installed some extra steel beams along the middle of the ceiling. Apparently these are to hang special lights on when we get to do shows and things in the new hall. Very exciting!

Also during the holidays, some workers from the council came and dug up all the footpaths on Larchwood Ave and then made some new ones for us…it makes the hall look even better. Thanks Auckland Super City!

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Term 1 week 11

Still more gib board stuff happening. This seems to be taking forever! We took some photos of some of their equipment too.

The drain people did some more work with pipes and things, and dug some more channels along the side of the hall. They also did some landscaping work with a little digger.

The last week of school for this term…we wonder what will happen over the holidays!

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Term 1 week 10 Apr 4th – Apr 8th 2011

The gib board continues to go on the inside of the walls. These guys have a better stereo than the other one, so we took a photo of it…and their toaster…yum!

Some other workers came this week and started digging up Lake Westmere! It looks as though they will be putting some drain pipes into the ground to make sure we don’t get flooded in the winter.

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Term 1 week 9 Great progress this week…the scaffolding started to get taken down! This means the builders must have finished lots of the outside bits.

They are still doing things inside the hall. Lots of wires were sticking out of the walls and it looked like coloured spaghetti. The builders are putting in the fluffy mat things into the wall frames and the ceiling. This is the insulation. It sounds very different in there now…much quieter and not as much echo as before.

They also started to put some covers on the walls over the insulation and the frames. We thought it was wood but it’s actually more like white plaster covered by cardboard sort of stuff. They called this Gib-board. It will go all over the walls inside.

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Term 1 week 8 It seems that there has been more of the same again this week! The boards on the outside are almost all on now and the painters continue to do the painting of the outside and the electricians are still doing electrical stuff inside.

The big excitement this week was the big truck with a crane on it that came to take away the builders shed. The driver used a remote control console thing that looked a bit like a PS4 handset to work the crane. He was very good at it! He hooked up the shed with big heavy chains and then the crane lifted it over the fence by the road and onto his truck. It was really interesting and lots of kids stopped to have a look on their way to school.

Our assembly this week in the Supertop was a bit cold and windy…we can’t wait to get into the hall soon!

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Term 1 week 7 More small changes are happening now on the hall. There are electricians in putting wires and things through the wooden frames inside. This is for the lights and power switches and things.

The weatherboards are still being nailed on the walls around the outside. This seems to be taking forever.

The great news is that some painters arrived today. They had to fill all the nail holes with stuff called putty so it could be painted over. This must have taken a very long time, because there are lots and lots of nails. They also had to paint grey paint called primer onto all the silver bits covering the joins in the wood. We think they will be here for a long time because they have to do an undercoat of paint first before they do the final layer. We still aren’t sure what colour it’s going to be. The painters had a cool machine that they were using as well as a very fluffy roller brush. We took a photo of them.

Because we are so special, we were lucky enough to get into the hall to have a quick look. We are the first children ever to go in there... yay for us!! media type="custom" key="8744464"

Term 1 week 6

Judging by the banging and sawing and stuff that has been coming from the hall, we are guessing that lots of work is still going on. There hasn’t been much actual change to show for it though. The builders must have been finishing off lots of little bits. The bricks on the front of the hall by the road look great and that part is probably finished.

The builders are still putting on the weatherboards on the walls around the outside. There are also lots of silver bits on the wood too. These are to cover the joint between the planks of wood so the rain doesn’t get in.

We sneaked a photo of the underneath part of the hall. It looks very dark and spooky…could be a good place to have the ghost stories for Freaky Friday later in the year?

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Term 1 week 5

Everything is on a roll now. The hall is looking very hall-ish (not sure if that’s a real word). The builders continued to put the wood on the outside of the walls. Apparently these are called weatherboards…probably because they are boards that keep the weather out!

The “brickie” (the name they give to the bricklayer) continued putting up the recycled bricks on the front of the building. He used cement stuff called mortar to hold them together. This got mixed up in a small electric concrete mixer. It’s starting to look really good.

Also this week, some enormous window frames got delivered. They looked really heavy and it took about 6 builders to carry them and lift them into place. They fitted perfectly, so they obviously got the measuring right. There was no glass in them to start with. They glass people came later and put in the windows and sliding doors into the frames.

For some reason, a few of the windows and doors at the back of the hall just got the weatherboards put on them. The builder said there were no frames for them yet so when they are ready they will need to cut a big hole in the walls again to put the windows in.

Its looking fantastic!

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Term 1 week 4

The big news this week was the “Roof Shout”. We didn’t know what this was all about at first but found out that it is an old tradition in the building industry. When the roof on a building is finished, the workers get together and have a bit of a party to celebrate. Our builders had a barbeque after school. They put up a flag on the end of the hall which is also part of the tradition…maybe it’s a signal of some sort to say ‘come and have a look’. We got some photos from inside, and it looks really big. We can almost imagine the whole school sitting in there for our first assembly!

The builders also started work on a deck area by one of the doors. This might be the main entrance way into the hall from the school grounds. Work also continued on the walls this week and slowly the hall is starting to be covered over.

There was some major sad news this week too. The big earthquake in Christchurch was really bad. Lots of buildings got destroyed and even worse, lots of people got hurt and killed. It’s really horrible and we talked about it a lot in class. We wish that our hall was finished so that we could invite some of the families whose houses got wrecked to come and stay in it.

The builders started putting up some bricks on the outside of the walls by Larchwood Ave. These are recycled bricks and we found out that they actually came from some buildings in Christchurch which were damaged in the first earthquake in September last year. This makes our hall extra special for us. We know were are very lucky and we feel very sorry for the people of Christchurch. It has been quite a sad week.

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Term 1 week 3

There was plenty more action this week. Bits were finished off with the floor and more roofing iron arrived and was put on so the roof looks pretty much finished now.

One day the builders wrapped up the outside of the hall in stuff which looked like a big snuggly blanket! We found out later that this is special paper that is quick thick and is waterproof. It is designed to stop dampness and moisture from getting into the frame when they put the walls on. Very clever! One of the builders said it was made out of something like Teflon which is like the non-stick coating on frying pans and things. Interesting.

We found a stack of wood inside the hall which looks like it could be for the walls. We also took some pictures of some of the power tools: two saws and a nail gun…looks dangerous!

Big excitement on Friday…they started to put the wood onto the walls! It’s a sort of yellow colour, but maybe it will be painted later…or not? The timing was great because tonight is our school picnic so lots of our parents will be able to have a look at what’s been happening for themselves.

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Term1, Week 2 2011

Wow! The hall building site has been like a beehive this week. Lots has happened, people everywhere, and some amazing progress…very exciting! Our parents who came to our goal-setting conferences this week were very interested to see it.

The iron for the roof got delivered by a crane and they put it way up on top of the roof framing. The builders then very quickly attached it to the steel frames and all of a sudden we had a roof! Very cool. We thought it was quite dangerous when they were working on top of the roof putting all the pieces on, but they seemed to know what they were doing.

When the roof was nearly finished, some other builders started putting down the floor. They had really big pieces of wood which they were nailing onto the floor frame. Before they put the floor on though, the builders were putting in some green fluffy mat stuff underneath. This is called insulation, which will help keep the hall warm. The green things were like the pink “batts” that you sometimes see in house walls or roofs. They attached these mats to the wooden frames with a stapler, a bit like a teacher’s staple gun…hopefully they will stay on, otherwise we might get cold bottoms in the winter!

They will probably be putting on the walls next.

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Term 1, Week 1 2011 Well, the summer holidays are over and we have all returned to school, eager to see our almost completed hall. Sadly there is still a long way to go!! Apparently the person who makes the roofing iron for all of NZ was away in the holidays so the builders couldn’t put on the roof, and therefore couldn’t put on the floor either. BUT instead they worked really hard and got the framing up for the walls!!

It looks amazing and really complicated. There is steel scaffolding everywhere. This is so the builders can climb around the building more easily. There are lots and lots of bits of wood nailed together in small rectangles, which the builder says makes the wall stronger. Some parts of it have 3 or 4 bits joined in a block. We have noticed that the wood around the window holes and door holes is much thicker than the rest…maybe it’s because these need to be stronger. The builder talked about “studs” which are the up & down planks and “dwangs” which are the across planks…strange names!

Looking into the hall, we can now see where the separate rooms are going to be. It looks like there will be lots of windows. Hopefully the roof will go on soon. It’s starting to get quite exciting!

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Term 4, Week 10 The big news of the week: After a bit of rain Lake Westmere has returned!

Work continued on the big puzzle that is the floor framing in the main part of the hall. They had to cut lots and lots and lots of small bits of wood and put them in between the big bits. This must be the strongest floor in the whole world!

Some scaffolding got put up on the sides this week too. Maybe the builders are getting organised to put the walls on next…or maybe it’s so they can get up onto the roof more easily?

The big concrete wall seems to be having a rest before the next part of its development. Maybe we could have a squash court built there instead of the skate park?

This will be our last blog post for a while because we are heading into the Christmas holidays (yahooooo!). Room 19 will continue the commentary in 2011. We look forward to seeing heaps of construction progress by the time we get back in January…who knows, maybe the hall could even be finished by then?????

Merry Christmas See ya soon.

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Term 4, Week 9 The wooden framing for the floor in the main part of the hall continues to be built. It seems to be taking a very long time, but they have to make sure it’s strong enough to hold up about 600 of us kids!

The concrete trucks arrived and they pumped liquid concrete out of the truck and onto the metal sheets on the end bit of the hall. Two guys spent a long time carefully raking it into place. They were walking around in the slushy concrete which must be great fun. They said it was actually really hot on their feet in there, even though they were wearing gumboots. They used big metal bars to smooth it out so it was perfectly flat. Then they used a machine that looked a bit like an upside-down windmill to smooth it out even more…very cool! Later on as it started to dry out and harden (they call this curing) they put garden sprinklers onto it. This is so that it doesn’t dry too fast which could make it crack. It looks great…we want to use it as a skate park.

The builders then took the small wooden frames off the sides of the concrete, leaving some bolts sticking up. We know now that the wall frames will be bolted to these, just like the steel frames on the main hall bit. We are starting to understand a bit more about building stuff!

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Term 4, Week 8

A bit of a surprise this week. Some of the wooden framing on the ground got covered over with metal sheets. We thought it was some kind of roof…BUT the builder told us that they are going to put concrete all over it to make the floor! They put lots more steel mesh sheets over it too which is the reinforcing to make the concrete stronger.

The main part of the hall has now got lots more wooden framing above the ground. This bit will have a wooden floor built straight on top of it. The builder said they need to put insulation underneath it first, otherwise it will be really cold in the winter.

The big gap in the concrete block wall was filled as well. Our idea of an underground carpark or glow-in-the-dark minigolf may not work out now.

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Term 4, Week 7 Things are starting to heat up now as the sun continues to shine. It’s good to see a few more people in orange vests working on our hall. The wooden poles got put into the ground with the big heavy ramming machine. It was pretty noisy again and the ground was shaking when the poles got driven in, on the yellow marks. The poles had some numbers spray painted on them. The builder said these were measurements to make sure the floor will be level. They dug some other holes and filled them with concrete…we think to make the ground stronger?

There were a few interesting machines this week: the concrete truck, the pole ramming thing, and a small vibrating machine called a compactor which flattened out some dirt inside the concrete blocks.

Some packages of wood delivered too (they look like Christmas presents…one has even got Christmas trees on the plastic wrapping!). Thank you Santa. This wood is going to be used to make the framing for the floor of the hall.

The builders started to put some more wooden framing on the ground in the extra bit on the end of the hall. They also used more big steel beams as well between the block walls. This will also be the foundations for the floor to be built on top.

We are looking forward to seeing more progress next week.

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Term 4, Week 6 After last weeks flurry of activity, not much has happened this week. Some wooden poles got delivered. Maybe the hall will be like a log cabin? No, not really! The builder said that they are going to be driven into the ground to be the foundations for the floor. They have painted big yellow X’s where the poles are going to go. It looks like it might be a bit noisy next week.

We took a photo of the builder’s stereo, because we could hear it!

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Term 4, Week 5 Wow…things are really starting to happen now! While we were at camp the builders started to put together the 3D puzzle, attaching the steel beams to the concrete block walls. We were right with our guesses last week - the builders bolted all the beams onto the concrete and then bolted them all together. How did they know which bits went in which place? We think they must have had a plan and maybe the steel pieces were labeled or had numbers on them to make it easier. They had a very big spanner to tighten the bolts.

Most of the framing is up and the hall actually is starting to look like a hall now. We can see where the walls will be and the shape of the roof.

Maybe they will put the walls up next?

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Term 4, Week 4

After another very quiet start to the week, things got exciting on Thursday. Some trucks arrived with some really big steel beams and poles. There was a crane which lifted them off the trucks and carefully put them inside the building site. This was interesting to watch.

Looking closely at the steel beams, there are lots of holes in them. We are thinking that these might be bolted to the concrete block walls as the frames for the walls of the hall, and maybe even part of the roof. It looks like some kind of giant 3D jigsaw puzzle.

We are away at camp next week, so we are looking forward to see how much more progress there is by the time we get back. 

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Term 4, Week 3

This week looks exactly the same as last week. Nice neat blocks in nice neat rows. We didn’t see any builders doing anything new! We are sure they haven’t finished yet. Hopefully there will be some more action on the building site next week.



Term 4, Week 2 This week it looks as though they have finished putting all the concrete blocks around the edges.

There are lots of rectangle holes around the sides, so maybe our idea of having a swimming pool isn’t such a good one. The water will probably leak out! One of the builders told us these holes were there for ventilation. There is a very big gap on the side by the road. They have either run out of bricks again, or this might be some kind of door. Maybe there will be an underground room instead of a pool?

It’s hard to know what will happen next. Maybe they will start building the walls of the hall on top of the concrete blocks, or there still might be some work to do inside the concrete walls. We aren’t quite sure.

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Term 4, Week 1 The laying of the concrete blocks around the edges continues. They ran out of blocks and had to get some more delivered. They came on a truck with a crane on, to lift them off into the building site.

There is still lots of steel framing around the outside. One of the builders was filling the inside of the block wall with concrete from a big hose. This must make the wall super-strong…probably even earthquake-proof!

There are some interesting orange pipes and other bolts and things sticking out of parts of the walls. We aren’t sure what these are for…maybe for the drains or lights or something.

Some of us think it would be a great idea to build an indoor swimming pool underneath the hall…wouldn’t that be awesome!

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Term 3 Holidays

Finally, after lots and lots of sunshine over the holidays, Lake Westmere has dried up and disappeared. We missed seeing the concrete truck doing its thing, but the concrete has been poured into the trenches to make the foundations. There are lots of steel poles sticking out of the ground. Maybe the walls might be joined onto them somehow.

Lots of concrete blocks got delivered, stacked in big piles. They looked a bit like giant Lego. One of the builders had a special saw that cut through some of the blocks and he used water from the hose to help.

The builders were very speedy once they started laying the blocks. They set them out in rows over the steel poles and stuck them together with special cement that they made in a little concrete mixer. The builders started in the corners so that the blocks overlapped each other which makes the walls stronger. media type="custom" key="7184941"

Term 3 Week 10

The tide is still high at Lake Westmere this week…more rain, more mud. The construction guys managed to put the steel cage things into the trenches this week. We know what they are now. There is a truck coming to pour concrete into the holes in the ground and the steel cages are called reinforcing. They are there to make the concrete stronger. The concrete will be part of the foundations. Hopefully we will see more progress after the holidays! media type="custom" key="6999285"

Term 3 Week 9 Another quiet week this week. The hall is looking….um…invisible! We saw some guys show up with a pump thing to drain Lake Westmere but then it rained again and filled it up. They left behind some steel cage things. We aren’t sure what these are for. Maybe it has something to do with the frame or the foundations? We don’t recommend swimming in Lake Westmere. The water is quite dirty.

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Term 3 Week 8 Welcome to Lake Westmere. Nothing happened this week…no contractors, no machines just lots of rain and some very big puddles. Perhaps we can have a floating hall instead?



Term 3 Week 7

Again, rain turned the building site into a bog. The construction men had to get a big pump to suck the muddy water out of the holes they had dug last week. They drilled some round holes using a giant drill attached to the bulldozer then picked up some big poles (like power poles) and carefully put them into the holes. This was really interesting to watch! Then came the noisy bit. The workers attached a big basher thing to the bulldozer and used it to ram the huge poles into the ground so there was only about 1 metre sticking out. This took ages and it made our classroom shake every time the machine hit the pole. The poles are really deep in the ground and they poured concrete around them too. We think they will start to build the floor of the hall on top of these…somehow. media type="custom" key="6827381"

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 140%;">Term 3 Week 6 Some wooden fence things went up this week. The construction guy said they were called footings. We think these must be the outline of the actual hall. It looks big! Some other guys came in with a camera thing on a tripod…we got a new word for our spelling list this week: “theodolite”. This is the name of the thing they used to measure exactly where the building needs to go. The surveyors marked out the ground with little white pegs and then sprayed different coloured fluro markings on the muddy dirt. Yay…the digger came back and started more careful scoops around the fluro marks and they started putting up string all over the place. We think these are called “plumb lines” and are used to line everything up in the right place. We are in danger of losing our sports equipment if the balls keep going over the fence. We are trying our best but….! Of course every building site needs one special thing…A PORTALOO! Ours is forest-green and looks very stylish, so we took a picture of it.

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<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 130%;"><span style="font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 140%;">﻿ Term 3 Week 5 <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 130%;">Lots and lots of rain have now turned the building site into a mud bog and we haven’t seen the workers for a week now… hopefully something will happen next week! <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 130%;">The biggest problem we face at the moment is keeping our soccer and rugby balls out of the area… it makes it a bit tricky at morning tea and lunchtime.

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Term 3 Week 4

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 140%;">It was interesting to witness the ground being dug up and smoothed out ready for the foundations of our magnificent new hall. Watching the mini-digger was fun and the skills of the bulldozer guy scooping out carefully measured amounts of dirt was really interesting. The big vibrations that we felt in CS19 made us think there was an earthquake! The compacting roller was very cool…some of us think this would be an awesome job when we are older.

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<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 140%;">Term 3 Week 3 <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive; font-size: 140%;">After years of planning and fund raising, construction of the hall has finally begun. In early August, marks were sprayed on the ground, posts put up and the lovely fluro-orange fence arrived. Progress at last!