I posted a while back about our 2 fuel oil tanks complete with $1500 worth of fuel oil, that dh got when he changed out a person's furnace. The point being that blessings can come in different ways, if you look for them.

Blessings that have come my way in the past week and a half:

My son was given a dodge dakota pickup for free...runs and everything!

My husband was given....a 2001 Dodge Ram 4WD ext cab truck!! (ok in need of $750 work but still free).

I picked up some summer goat's milk customers for 3 - 5 gallons a week at $8 a gallon, until late August when they leave their summer home.

I pre-sold some chickens  this weekend for $90. I just wanted a deposit, but he paid for all of them.

I had a call today for someone to pickup goat's cheese tomorrow...that'll be another $10.

I've been extremely thankful to God for these strange and unexpected blessings from odd places lately. Sometimes we don't get what we pray for, but we get some things just as helpful!!

It took me a VERY long time to fully understand the concept of turning over our concerns to the Lord and letting him deal with things for me.  Once I learned to do that, I found that He works things out for me so much more concisely when I stop worrying about them! 

Your blessings this week-and-a-half are truly fabulous!  Congratulations!

I am so happy for you  

What wonderful blessing for your family Michelle

Michelle,

 Here is one that I posted in "prayer circle" the other day.  It was one of those things that was too "on target" to just be coincidence -

 http://community.stretcher.com/forums/t/1299.aspx?PageIndex=13

Just wanted to share this:

  Some background on me: I have a chronic, incureable, almost untreatable skin condition.  This condition is not fatal, it's just unsightly and uncomfortable, sometimes very painful.  Since I have gotten into my 30's, the skin condition has  become more prevalent and is continuing to worsen as my hormones change with age. I have done research in the past and unfortunately not much is known about it.  All of the treatment is reactive instead of preventive, consisting of  antibiotics (which leave lumps on my legs if I take them long enough to actually affect the condition), topical antiseptics and bandaids.  I had read  about people making a sort of tea with Turmeric and that it was helping, but I just couldn't seem to get into the groove (mainly because it tasted *SO* bad).

I recently became frustrated with this condition and just threw my hands up and told God that I just couldn't take it anymore. All I wanted was a break. Just one break. 

Well - hang on to your hats -

The next day I did some piddling around on the internet and suddenly stumbled upon a whole slew of webpages talking about this condition.  Tons of people talking about what they are doing to help their skin.  They mentioned that they are taking turmeric, but in pill form, and had wonderful results.  So, I thought, "ok, I'll try to find these pills, but I'll bet they are expensive and hard to get ahold of."  I mentioned this to my friend at work (whom I introduced to MyPoints, where you get points for clicking a button in emails and for shopping online) and she says to me, "you know, MyPoints has a link to this vitamin company."

I went to the webpage, searched for the vitamin company, found the pills AND got 3 bottles of 100 capsules each (a sale of buy 1 get 2 free) for 6 dollars and 20 cents (not to mention 3 points per dollar on MyPoints).

So,  How's that for a Heaven-sent break? 

Praise the Lord!

As soon as I was distressed about something about our charter school, dd age 6 received a scholarship in the mail for our Lutheran school.  It will pay 75% of tuition from now until 8th grade, as long as we qualify.  Tuition is $4400, so for $1100 that we'll pay from her child tax credit, she will be in a combined 1st and 2nd  classroom, good for her as she is a smartie, with about 8 other kids, religion most days, chapel on Wednesday, the cook makes good vegetarian lunches for the kids.  Sports are $75 for a family for the year. She can be in a children's choir that goes to perform in some nursing homes.  

I signed her up!  

Her sister, age 9,  who needs special ed, will miss her a lot, but I think it is better for the 6 yo.  I think I am acting in each child's best interest. 

 This a small one but good example of how G'd cares for all of us. I make jelly and jam. There is an older man in town that loves jelly. I will send him a jar occasionally and he will send me back the empty jar to fill again. Recently, he has been bringing me boxes of cereal. He gets them in the senior good boxes and at food pantrys. It is expensive organic type cereals. Sat. he brough me 7 boxes. I gave him three jars of jelly. Sunday, we had a picnic for Bible study leaders. The family that hosted it have a hard time with finances. I decided to bring her some cereal. So picked out 5 boxes. She was so excited. Last Fri., one DD had ask her if they could get some cereal. She gave me a bag of squash and cilantro from her garden. I needed the cilantro for pesto. My other friend had given me basil. I divided the squzsh . DH will drop some off a bag  to my friend that gets me free bread.  Thank G'd for His provision in many different ways. Babs

Thank you for this post. This was very uplifting to read and a great way to start my (work) week!

This is something that I really struggle with: It's hard for me to just "give it to God". I'm a control freak by nature and when you couple that with the fact that neither my husband nor I ever had anything handed to us (if we have it it's because we worked really hard for it), then it's very difficult to just let go of the wheel and let God step in. Both my husband and I are use to working very hard for whatever we need and want and have always been very independent (mostly because we had to be). But as I get older I realize that in the many areas where I/we fall short that God can lift us up if we would only let Him! We are so full of pride for "doing it ourselves" that we can even let that go and accept God's help when we need it. Sometimes it feels like God isn't working in our lives, to meet our needs, but maybe that's because we wont step back and Let Him!!! God wants surrender. But it's something that I've been praying very hard about and I know that God hears my prayers. I try to remind myself that God will never give me more than I can handle, He will always provide whatever I need (which may or may not always been as much as I WANT) and He will always work through others to touch my life. But it's up to me to put my trust in Him, to turn to Him when in need, and to accept His help in whatever form it may come.

God bless and I hope to see more posts in this thread. Like I said, it was very uplifting and incredibly encouraging!!!!

Julie

Thanks, Michelle, for your posting. I hope you continue to be blessed. It was a wonderful (and timely for me) reminder that I can't do it all. I can't do it alone. I can't predict the outcome. Can you tell I like control? I just need to leave in the hands of the L-rd and He will provide. On His terms!

I am going to try to find ways to bless others with what we have been given. It doesn't have to be monetary all the time as these other posts have stated.

Wow lots of blessings Michelle!  Thats great.   Nice thread.  I think we get blessed all the time.    We give a lot to thrift stores, friends, playgroups etc.  and it comes back.

Some events are blessings in disguise. When I was laid off from my job just before xmas (nice people,nice place), I was very upset but within days applied for the job I have now which is better.   It is truly family friendly place and flexible were the last job was suppose to be.  But I had to go though the last job to get this one. 

We have been blessed in the last month with an antique bathroom vanity (sink in a wood cabinet) for free. just exactly what I wanted.

a kids ball pit and dinosaur toy box from a friend

some free food from a picnic

a old tent trailer

a trailer from a friend so we will relist the trailer we got from craigslist for free in the free section.

free radical? arm saw free from craigslist.

 half price flooring.

There are blessings so small we could overlook them if we take things (or God) for granted.

Finding a bag of 12 beer cans while walking the dog that I can return to the store for .10 each is a blessing.  That happened a couple of weeks ago.

Today the person that bought the extra cheese from me happened to be a realtor and gave me alot of advice on how to approach purchasing the foreclosed property next door to me for less than half the price it's listed at. You never know where you might make a connection with someone that is helpful!

I helped someone move a couple of years ago and she gave me 4 50 lb bags of wheat for grinding into flour because she couln't take them with her.