I’m sitting in my living room on a quiet Saturday morning. As often happens on days like today, I am grateful for the many blessings in my life – for my relationship with God, which has sustained me all these years. I’m so thankful for my husband, who is a Godly man, adores me, cares for me in every way. I’m blessed with my children, and now grand children. I’m thankful for my family, and spending time with them.

When I was aged 17-30, I was broke. At times I was on the poverty line – other times, below. I’m so grateful my parents would help when things got desperate! I lived in Florida as a single mom, working a minimum of 2 jobs, and I never had a car with air conditioning. My old Datsun got me from Utah to Florida and back – I literally drove that car until it fell apart. The last straw was sitting in the median and my entire exhaust system falling off.

I lived in a 800 square foot apartment, making $1000 a month. I made the best of it, though going to do my laundry at the laundry mat was a trial. I did like that I could get it all done at once. I just had to keep my three year old occupied.

When I married and moved to Washington in 1990, I thought I’d be better off financially – after all, he was a police officer, making $80k a year. I was in for a rude awakening – due to a gambling addiction, he had nothing to show for his wages. So we struggled financially. He was fired for insubordination in 1993, and things quickly went downhill.

We moved to Illinois, where he worked at his fathers business, getting paid under the table. I didn’t see the money. When he left for his girlfriends house for good, I knew I had to do something different. In 1995 I was working full time, going to school – and pregnant with my third child. No child support would come forth for almost 2 decades, and then it was court ordered, and trickled in irregularly.

Throughout it all, I was geographically distant from my family during the college years. My church was my family, and I did my best to raise the kids on a paupers income. They learned the value of money, of saving, budgeting, tithing. They definitely learned the difference between needs and wants.

Those years of college where the toughest yet. I had a baby, a 4 year old, and a sick 10 year old – a child with a chronic illness that was in and out of the hospital frequently. I lived in a series of dives, drove a series of clunker cars that fell apart one by one, and learned to stretch my money with coupons.

With the help of my parents and my church, I graduated from nursing school in 1997. Things began to improve.

When I moved back to Florida in 2000, seeing the laundry mat brought me to tears. I was – and am – so grateful for a washer and dryer! When I go past the tiny apartment I lived in, I’m reminded how far I’ve come. Riding in an air conditioned car, I remember the years of tossing my hair up and going to work in a tank top and shorts, just to clean up and get dressed when I got there.

I don’t take any of it for granted.

My kids grew up on hand-me-downs and good will finds. They had limited toys, but unlimited love. They ate meals out of boxes with the word Helper on them, and ate a lot of potatoes. They waited for movies to come out on VHS. They played outside with cheap water toys, and spent time at the beach with a dollar store bucket and shovel.

Despite this, or maybe because of it, they are good people. They are all adults now, and they all are servants – they look for opportunities to help others. They have sympathetic hearts. They are grateful for what they have – none of them are materialistic.

It was tough in the broke years, but it makes me count my blessings every single day.

God was faithful to my little family, and the heritage of that faithfulness is continuing on to the next generation.

I say a pray of thankfulness today, and every day.