First of many

It's no secret that I love to show our teachers how valuable they are to us.  When I take lunch to my kiddos in elementary school, often times, I'll email the teacher that morning and say, "I'm bringing Natalie Wendy's (or Subway, or Arby's...whatever she'd chosen for the day) today, is there anything I can bring you?"  Needless to say, it's a huge hit!  Our teachers have, like, 3 milliseconds for a lunch break.  There is no lunch "hour" where they can leave, run an errand, or go have a nice lunch, like most other professions.  Their options are what they packed from home, or the nasty food served at school, and I would imagine that gets old fast!.  Bleh!  I also love to find out what their favorite soda is, and randomly send a cold soda in for them to enjoy during their work day.  (There are no soda machines at any of our schools now, and this small gesture is always greatly appreciated)

The lunch tradition started 2008 when Natalie had her heart condition, and I just felt like her teacher was going WAY above and beyond in caring for her through that ordeal.  Being able to send your child to school with a scary heart condition, and know the teacher loves her and is watching out for her was invaluable to me.  I wanted to continually show my appreciation in some tangible way.  I wanted to do something nice for her, but it wasn't Christmas, and wasn't her birthday, so I asked my sister, a teacher, what she would think if one of her students' parents offered to bring her lunch, when they brought their kids...she said she would LOVE it!!  And thus, a new tradition was born.  I want those teachers to see my kids' name on their roster at the beginning of the year and think, "YES!!!" :)

This year is the first year, in 10 that I don't have any in elementary school.  It's more difficult to fully spoil our teachers in middle school and high school because they have 7 different teachers each day, and Owen only goes to 1/2 day preschool 3 days a week.  Even so, I still like to give small reminders along the way that I know how much of themselves they give to these kiddos every day, and that I appreciate it more than I could possibly express.  I guess having been a preschool teacher makes me understand what HARD work being a teacher is.  :)

Last month, I made this recipe, packaged it up and gave them a small token of my appreciation.  Yummy, homemade carmel popcorn!!  :)


I'm always on the lookout for the next thing I can do for our teachers....any ideas??
~mj~