I truly had nothing I wanted this holiday season. This is my first year teaching and I've really needed supplies for my classroom and my kids.

My Rematch Santa was willing to listen and was willing to understand that. I am so sorry I blasted you with like... seven thousand messages. You had no idea what you were getting into when you messaged me, whoops on your part :P So what if it's Groundhog Day, let's get this Xmas party started!

I have an overwhelming wishlist on Amazon for supplies to say the least. Brandon did an awesome job finding items that are in great need. In the picture where I am holding the box of erasers, you can clearly see I need Post-its because of the writing on my hands...

I'm trying to find ways to encourage my students to work harder and do more, and even though they're in 7th grade, I think stickers may be a way to motivate them. I'm so thankful to Brandon for picking out some Owl-some stickers!

But seriously, can we stop and look at this virus model for a moment. Oh, I'm a science teacher. This virus model, though. Even Novacat was all "This thing looks interesting." It comes all the way apart to show the different parts of a virus, and it can be displayed on a stand. I'm stoked to have something educational and wicked cool to display year round. I've gotta get the rest of these! Too cool not to have!

I'm so excited for the tape!! My students do interactive notebooks. We're about to start new ones next week (aka: lots of tape needed, omg). I just ran out of tape on my dispenser today, put my next to last roll on it, was planning a supply closet run, but didn't want to put more weight on that than I had to... my masking tape rolls are about out. Then these packages show up on my porch and BAM! 12 rolls of tape! You rock my brightly colored socks right off ... no, seriously, it's the end of the day, my feet are tired.

Thank you again, Brandon! You've made my first year of teaching quite a bit brighter, and I'll never forget you for it :D!

EDIT on 2/7/15:

OMG, so I got THREE MORE BOXES THIS WEEK! HOLY. I... I don't even know what to say!!! I will gladly give a break down and explain how incredibly emotionally thankful I am for all of this!

I come home from a rough early work week. My husband is gone for the third time this year, already. He isn't military and his job usually doesn't make him travel this much. He usually travels two to three times a year, but here we are, first week of Feb, and he's on his third trip. I'm emotionally devastated because I do not do well with separation. I also have a lot of health issues and need a lot of help with little things around the house, and with him gone, they can't get done. For example, Nova and Nebula's litter boxes can't be scooped, I can't carry the trash bags out, I can't carry the laundry down or upstairs... stupid house chores that I necessary for life, I can't do without my husband. So not only was I dealing with insane kids at school, I was dealing with a dip in my depression and was in a lot of physical pain in general this week.

I come home to find two more boxes on my porch. Brandon messaged me to say there would be five boxes total and my brain said "This is just insane, he did NOT need to do all this, I am not worth this much! My kids are, my job is, but I am not."

I open up my gifts, the little box first. It's a DVD! It's the new "Cosmos" series with Neil deGrasse Tyson! At this point, I just start crying. I'm barely inside my front door and my kitties are crawling all over me as they always do first thing when I get home from work. Nova (my white and orange cat - and yes, his name is Nova) starts rubbing his face all over my arm and then the DVD. I decided this would be a good opportunity to try to get a picture, trying to keep me and my ugly crying self out of it... but I tried to smile just in case I ended up in it, I didn't want to take ten million pictures, so sorry it's blurry - lol! Later in the evening, I track down my gray cat, Nebula (yeah, I'm a nerd...) and show her the DVD. She does the same thing, rub her little cheeks all over it. She hates the flash on my camera, so I just did my front facing camera, so sorry this picture is beyond crap.

Next, I opened up my large, wide but flat box. Inside I found a tube and another model! This model is of an animal cell! It has a TON of small pieces. It will look so wicked awesome all put together. I've not put it together quite yet, as this week has just been slammed pack busy. It is so vibrant in color. I cannot wait to use it as a review tool for testing at the end of the school year and next year for teaching.

The tube had two industrial, super thick staples at each end. It was like they thought whatever was inside was going to become sentient and escape... which kind of worried me a bit. I had to go find pliers to get this sucker open... which was a challenge unto itself in our chaotic home. I got the tube open (after a ten minute pliers hunt and five minute tube struggle) and found a beautiful Meiosis poster! It's already laminated, too! That meant I didn't have to go down to the school supply store down the street to get it laminated and cut by people who care (and pay to have it done instantly) or have it done by the kids who help out in the library and risk having it damaged (and have it done for free and wait a few days). The poster came at the PERFECT time because we're just finishing up genetics and Meiosis is a topic my kiddos have been struggling to grasp. The next morning, I put that baby up immediately. It fits on my ugly-brown-chalkboard-that's-been-covered-in-bulletin-board-paper-and-turned-into-a-magnetic-bulletin-board-so-I-don't-have-to-staple-and-put holes-all-up-in-my-brand-new-posters perfectly! The kids noticed it instantly! It is a statement poster! A large group gathered around it first thing in the morning. I should have grabbed a picture, but due to other happenings, I couldn't quite make that happen, sadly.

I get home that evening and I see this MAMMOTH box on my front porch. I sat in my car for a moment and stared at it, not too sure what to do. I had the moment of "Oh hell... what is I can't move it? I don't like any of my neighbors... who am I going to call to help me move this box? Mom's at work and Dad's in bed... f." I go to move it, and it's certainly heavy, but I can wiggly it into the house and manage to clear the doorway. The cats immediately wanted to be in it before I had it open... like all cats, ours are box lovers. Our house is full of boxes.. we constructed a homemade boxfort using the boxes from our wedding gifts for them. Anyways, I pop this giant box open and stare inside and I just stare and think "Is this really what it says it is? There's no way he did this... He's done so much, I cannot believe he's done all of this.. I.." and I basically collapsed onto the floor in a puddle of tears again. As a teacher, if you see a box this large and it says something like this, you're pretty damn certain it's not going to be what it says on it... but it was.. it's 18 boxes of Kleenex! And it's the BIIIG boxes! Each one has 200+ tissues in it. They also each have a boxtop! That's $1.80 for our school right there! Boxtops add up, man.

I carried this box into school the next day and everyone was saying "Why did you purchase that? That's insanely expensive, just use the paper towels!" and I had too much fun saying "They were given to me as a gift from a complete stranger who actually cares about teachers! There are great people out there!" When I got it to my classroom and all my teammates made it in, they all had the same initial shock of.. "Is that actually what is says it is?" We divvied up the tissues and then stored the rest in our team closet. The box is of an excellent size, too! We put in our other donated items like paper towels and clorox wipes that are left. So now our storage closet is a little bit neater thanks to a big box, too! Our kids were so so happy to see actual tissues in the classrooms on Friday. We several kids getting chapped cheeks essentially from using the tree bark based bifold brown paper towels every 10 minutes to blow their nose. Most of our kids come from an area where their parents provide next to nothing, so they don't come to school with their own tiny pack of tissues, pencils, paper, notebooks, anything. We're essentially expected to supply everything. If we don't, the kids often whine, refuse to do their work, become disruptive, and it often goes on from there. Having actual tissues in the class can actually causes issues, too. Some kids use it as an excuse to get up out of their seats every 3-5 minutes. In the classes where it's really bad, we just leave tree bark out and put the nice stuff away... works pretty damn well. We're in the midst of cold/flu/strep season, so having tissues is a Godsend.

Brandon F., you are an amazing person for listening and caring so very much. We need more people like you out there. The fact that you're a rematch alone made me thankful, but you just went above, beyond, and beyond the beyond. You've made this past month quite a bit easier. The majority of the supplies are already in use. I've been using the stickers this past week to signify extra credit on an assignment. The tape is already on my dispenser. The tissues are in each of our 5 classrooms. My cats are enjoying the boxes. The poster is on the board. My models are on my book shelf in the classroom. The rest of the supplies are just waiting to go into rotation as soon as what little is left is used up. Thank you. Thank you so very much. You're Owl-standing! Lots of love and appreciation, Emily G.