Kindergarten teacher sobs when Secret Santa surprises her with a car at school
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Secret Santa is back and this Christmas is bigger than ever!
The EastIdahoNews.com team is busy helping a local man gift more than $500,000 this holiday season. A lot more. Secret Santa is a real person who wants to remain anonymous and hopes to help as many people as he can.
We will be surprising deserving people and families every day from now until Christmas with gifts unique to their circumstances.
Darci Orchard is the type of person who makes everyone in the room feel loved and cared for the moment you meet her. But behind her smile, there is a woman who has experienced tremendous hardship.
She is a single mom of three awesome kids. Her oldest daughter has Down syndrome and is much like a toddler trapped in a teenager’s body. Caring for her daughter is often exhausting, both physically and mentally, but Darci carries this challenge with love and grace.
Darci has supported her kids as a kindergarten teacher at Templeview Elementary. When COVID canceled classes, Darci organized a teacher parade and even delivered graduation signs to each of her kindergartner’s homes so they would know they were loved and valued.
Last winter, Darci was out of work for nearly a month as she was very ill and her daughter was hospitalized with influenza and pneumonia. This led to further financial strain as she paid medical bills and worried about how to help her young students continue to learn while she was incredibly sick and caring for her own children.
Darci’s modest vehicle broke down last fall and the repairs have been too costly for her to get fixed. Her neighbors sold her an old car that had been intended to be driven by their teenager and she has been limping along with this for a year, though this vehicle is not reliable for any form of long-distance travel. She had been saving to pay for repairs on her car, but this summer someone helping to water her lawn while she was away with family neglected to turn off the hose and she returned to a flooded basement. Once again, money that she had been saving had to be used to cover repairs on her home.
Darci needs a reliable car that is big enough to fit her three teens and their gear. She needs to be able to safely travel to Twin Falls so that her kids can spend time with their grandparents and she can have some respite.
Secret Santa asked the EastIdahoNews.com elves to surprise Darci during a recent faculty meeting at her school. Watch the video above to see her unforgettable reaction!
