Monday Made It...Almost!

Ok...I'll admit it, I have a Monday Made It in my head that never quite materialized until I looked at this morning's offerings!

Amanda over at Teaching Maddeness shared her take on this cute little pencil dispenser idea that has been floating all over Pinterest as of late:

Using a restaurant-styled straw dispenser seems to be the way to go if you are a "Community Classroom" teacher like me...the kids all hand in their pencils at the beginning of the year (my teaching partner and I ask for yellow, #2 pencils...no graphics!).  I then sharpen pencils and have them at the ready for my students all day long!  Love how there are no sharpener lines in the classroom and I can cut out some of the shenanigans that go on when kids are moving around the room or waiting in sharpener lines!

If you are stalking blogs like this, then you may have heard about how expensive these little babies can be and how hard they can be to find or purchase.

With nothing in my Monday Made It blog hands, I decided to go on a quest that I started over a month ago...I wanted to find a reasonably priced straw dispenser that I can call my very own...SUPER AMAZING PENCIL DISPENSER OF EPIC PROPORTIONS! ("Epic" is my eleven-year-old's favorite word right now, so it just seemed to fit!  Thanks Noah!) 

It seems like everyone is going to Amazon.com or seeking these out on eBay or Craig's List.  I decided to go right to the source:  restaurant supply!  The first site I checked had these little babies for about $25.00.  However, when I went to the checkout, I found that they had a $50.00 minimum on purchases.  Not so good...

Undaunted, I went to another site where you had to have a special restaurant code to purchase...since I'm not in "the club," this wasn't an option for me either!

Then...finally...(insert sigh here), I found a site that had an acrylic straw dispenser for $27.20 + $7.99 shipping and handling!  No minimum orders here...and no special codes...you can even say you are purchasing for yourself!  

It looks like a 2-3 day turnaround and your order comes via UPS!  I so love this!  So place your order today, and you should have it by the end of the week! 

Since I'm the type of girl to plug AMAZING CUSTOMER SERVICE, I'm going to share the source and give a huge shout out to Account Manager JENNIFER BEACH!  This sweetie called me less than 2 hours after placing my order, just to see if there was anything else she could do to make shopping with her organization any better.  Are you kidding me?  This is GINORMOUS!  

So, what are you waiting for?  Go online and get your own "Super Amazing Pencil Dispenser of Epic Proportions" (a.k.a. straw dispenser) at:

Don't forget...share the love!  Pass this info on to a colleague who wants to make his/her own "Super Amazing Pencil Dispenser of Epic Proportions!"  Sharing is caring!

Nikki