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Saturday, April 28, 2012

Humbled by my many blessings

Every week I get in my mini van and drive to town with my list and checkbook and go into a store and load my cart with food for the week.  I have a strict budget and can't go over, but my cart is full and our meals are planned and ready for the week.  I normally then take the gas money I have set aside and fill my vans tank up.  I drive home to a house that is ours and have the nerve to feel frustrated that we have yet to be able to put siding on the house and wonder if our place will ever look half as nice as so and so.  I then walk inside my home and put the food bought into our refrigerator and have the nerve to have a desire for a new kitchen floor that isn't scratched up and worn out.  I proceed to fix our next meal.  We sit down to eat as a family and talk about our day and the week ahead.  According to our bank account, we are not rich by any measure.  But today I went with the confirmation class I am leading to do a service project  at a nearby university.  We built beds to give to kids in the area that aren't upset because the ice cream they like  wasn't in the food budget for the week, but who wonder if they will have supper that night.  They don't get upset because they don't have the newest style bedding because they don't even have beds at all in many cases.  Some are just sleeping on the floor, some on bedding left out for the garbage that someone threw out.  There are many, many reasons why these children don't have the basic comforts that we so often take for granted.  We sometimes look at an adult and think they just need to do X to improve their situation or that they went on the wrong path and ended up where they are.  The truth is, we don't know every ones story.  I do know that a little 6 year old doesn't deserve to  sleep on the hard floor or to sleep on something that had been thrown in the trash.  As I lay my own little girl down tonight in her little white bed I picked out and cover her up with the blanket she and I picked out with the butterflies on it, I can't imagine her having to sleep on the floor because we couldn't get her a bed. or not to have sheets for her because there just weren't any.  The only things out of place in her own room are the toys that didn't get picked up before bedtime.  Each night my children go to bed in their own bed and with clean sheets and warm blankets. The only difference is tonight, I will be singing a prayer of thanksgiving for all that we have. And I will be  saying a prayer for the children who will receive the beds the kids built today that they will see Gods love for them and that their trials will not last for ever.


3 comments:

  1. What a beautifully written piece! You have done a wonderful job here, and really will make many of us think. You have a wonderful family, and your compassion and love shines through every one of them. Blessings dear!
    ps. I had no bed until I was 2 and a half, slept on a mattress on the floor with one blanket between two of us, and my sister was in a banana box. so I know how this is. thx so much for bringing attention to it. Mary B.

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  2. Patti Worley just checking in to say you seem to be a wonderful daughter, wife and mother.

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    1. Thank you very much. I hope you all are well.

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