Feeling Blessed

Wow, didn't realize how long it had been since checking in with the blog. What an amazing couple of weeks it has been. I have been witness to several answers to prayer lately that continue to remind me that God is present, which is always a good thing for me!
As some of you know, we would be under the category of a "paycheck to paycheck" family. Yes, we have read the books and attended the budget seminars about savings and streamlining budgets blah blah blah and we do the best we can with what we get. We know that for us it is all about choices, and we choose to live in an expensive town on one income so we know that there will always be things that we have to live without. Sometimes, that even includes groceries. Long story short, I have continuously gone to God in prayer that somehow, someway, money would fall from the sky and land in our lap. Low and behold we got an unexpected check in the mail about a week ago. Our insurance company finally recognized a few bills that we had paid last year and actually sent us a refund check - praise God! I know to many people that wouldn't seem like a big deal, but for us it was a huge answer to prayer!
Continuing the praises...Last week we were supposed to go to Disneyland and the Science Center in Los Angeles for some much needed family time. Of course, my two boys ended up with fevers and I was in panic mode. I was shoving Zyrtec, OJ, and vitamins down their throats as fast as I could to no avail. When Thursday morning finally came and we were due to leave all 3 kiddos had fevers and I was struggling to figure out what to do. Knowing that all I could do was give it to God, I started to pray. Actually, the more accurate phrase would be I began fervently begging God to heal my kids. By the time we got to Los Angeles, all three kids were fever free! Their fevers never came back and never turned in to runny noses, coughs, or ANYTHING! Praise God!
One final praise...We have been really trying to fit in as much quality family time as possible knowing that Matt will be gone a LOT this year with conferences, camps, training, and missions trips. The kids really have been wanting to go to the snow, which when you live in Santa Barbara isn't always easy. We are feeling SO blessed that friends are letting us borrow their cabin in Mammoth for part of spring break! The kids will already be out of school, Matt will already be excused from his PE job because there isn't any school so he won't have to request time off, and the best part is it's FREE! I feel like stuff like this never happens to us, but I am counting my blessings while they do. We are hoping there will still be snow, and that the kids won't kill each other on the 6 hour drive, but at least that will make for another fun post :)