So Very Blessed

Sometimes I need to take a moment and remember how very blessed we are to have all that we have, not just the material things, but our health, our family, our freedom. When I see stories about the grim outcome of separating conjoined twins, abducted children, murders, drugs, etc, it makes me realize how much we have in terms of each other. As for my family, we are pretty healthy for the most part, we have a safe place to live...and we have each other. Family is such an important part of our lives--immediate family, extended family, and family that we have adopted as our own. I am so lucky to have all these people in my life. Of course, family is not the only way we have been blessed. We have nice cars to drive, a nice house to live in (by our standards, anyway), food to eat, and the kids have toys to play with and a yard to run in (even if it does look more like a jungle right now). How petty it is when we start comparing the "things" in our lives against others who might have more. More often, we should be comparing our lives against those who have nothing, and suddenly, we would remember, or maybe realize for the first time, just how very blessed we really are. This post is a preclude to my next post about our amazing trip to the beach, which, in some ways makes me feel guilty at times, but most of the time, just plain happy that we have a place to go every year to make priceless family memories. Pictures of our beach time are coming soon....