One Huge Blessing in These Tough Times

Ugh. I keep forgetting to come here and post every night. My goal is to keep a blog counting my daily blessings, no matter how big or small. Today I have a big one.

The economy is a disaster, and we're really feeling it here at home. What we used to spend on two carts full of food at the market, we now spend on one. Gas to heat our homes and electric have gone through the roof. Water is higher. Clothing is set to go up in price this year. I won't even talk about fuel prices for our cars. Thank God I don't drive that often. A tank of gas can last me a month sometimes, which is a true blessing.

Here's the biggie. We've been living in the same house now for 14 years. We moved in here when we had just two children. It was one side of a duplex, and we fit just fine. We had another baby a year later and still had enough room. Over the years, we continued to grow our family and ended up having three more children all the while living in a tiny three-bedroom duplex. It was rough, but the rent was a cheap $300 a month. Our home was owned by our neighbor's son. Our neighbor sadly died last summer. It was really hard because we really cared for him. His son doesn't live in our town and didn't want to deal with maintaining the house so offered to let us bust open the walls and make it one giant house. This was a double blessing because not only is it so much roomier, but they only asked us to pay an extra $100 a month to cover taxes. Nowhere in this country can you rent a house half the size of what we have for $400 a month. Okay, so here's another blessing. They want us to buy the house. They just don't want it anymore and will put it up for sale if we don't buy it. Last summer my WONDERFUL mother-in-law went to be with the Lord. She was a truly fabulous lady, and I miss her every single day. Her estate wasn't enormous, but she left us enough that we'll be able to not only buy the house but also pay for it in full if we so desire, possibly within the next few months. Even if we go without a down payment, which may be possible but not what I want to do, our mortgage payment will be less than our rent payment now. That's how cheap they're selling us the house! Now, it isn't a fancy house at all, but in these hard economic times I just want a place to live in that we can afford and won't be thrown out of if one of us loses our job. THIS, my friends, is a HUGE blessing! Many people are losing their homes right now, so I'm very thankful that we're able to secure ours.