An extremely cold prank

I went to school today already extremely under the weather. After what happened this afternoon, I now feel 100x worse! In the afternoon, we had a fire drill. I knew it wasn't one of our "drills" since we already had the scheduled two. We left the classroom ASAP, without jackets. Halfway down the stairwell, I hear the security yelling for us to grab jackets. Uhm first of all, we're halfway down the stairs and there are students everywhere, and if this is a real fire, we're bolting. So my students and I were all standing outside without jackets. You may think you know what cold is but you have NO idea how bad it was. I tried to huddle and hug as many as I could but it was just so bad. After about 20 minutes, another security saw what was happening and sent nearby teachers to go back in to retrieve the jackets. We needed to stand out there to wait for the police and firefighters to show up and to check everywhere. They brought back our jackets but three students were still missing theirs. Another teacher who is always prepared and wearing tons of layers, offered her huge bubble jacket so two of my boys shared one. That still left one boy without a coat so I gave him mine. Funny thing is, my jacket looked good on him, very military-ish. So there I was, without a jacket, for another 40 minutes. I was still huddling them but then a lot of them started to ask me if I wanted their jackets and one of them decided to have a "Operation - Keep Ms. ______ warm!" Honestly, at that point it was my hands that were unbearable, they were so red and they still actually are at this moment. Well, one of my sweet girls saw this and she took her tiny hands out of her pockets and just started rubbing mine to try to keep them warm. I seriously was fighting back the tears because I was so touched by that! It's moments like that that make it all worth it, and it's also proof that I've made a difference. Granted I was freezing on the outside, but was my heart warmed after that!

Oh, it wasn't a real fire, apparently someone had pulled the alarm but I'm not even sure if they know who had done so. Trust me, I gave my students a long ranting about how dangerous and wrong it is to do something like that.

There has been so much (ups & downs) that I've wanted to blog about but due to privacy issues, I save those stories for in person. Though, hopefully I will find some time (and I hope it works) to post some of the sweetest notes/pictures that I've received. Seriously, there was one whole week where it all came pouring in at once!