Our Spring Break began a little early, with part of our family leaving last Thursday to head to the state quarter finals basketball games in Oklahoma City. It was fun cheering for friends and watching the excited teams and fans all over the stadium. The next day we headed to the Oklahoma State Fairgrounds, meeting up with the rest of our family, to prepare for the Oklahoma Youth Expo (OYE).
OYE prides itself as being the world's largest junior livestock show. 4-H and FFA members from all over the state of Oklahoma head to the fairgrounds during spring break every March. Our children show meat goats, while others show cattle, pigs, and sheep. It's a lot of work for the 4-H and FFA members, their agriculture education teachers, 4-H leaders, and parents, but it is also a lot of fun! It's a great learning experience, too.
While we were having fun going to basketball games and livestock shows, the people in Japan were facing the devastation, destruction, and heartache of the effects of an 8.9 earthquake and tsunami.
While we were deciding which restaurant to go to, many around the state were evacuating their homes and loosing their homes due to wildfires - some that were set intentionally.
While we were having fun together as a family, friends were facing the death of a mother and grandmother.
Spring Break and other vacation times are much-needed and much-appreciated. They are great times to make special memories. But, even in those times, let's not ever forget about the people around us. Let's be sure to remember to pray for them and help them in any way that we can.
And, let's never forget to count our blessings, to love each other, and cherish the times we do have together, because we never know when we might be the ones facing those same difficult situations.
Yes, we (well, my husband, of course, who is the Disaster Relief guy) got several calls while on Spring Break about how our church might respond financially to Japan. It made me feel a little bit guilty that we were enjoying ourselves...
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