The McDonalds version of a "Pentecostal handshake"

We've been so very blessed with support - emotional and financial - since starting Financial Peace University. While attempting to get our entire financial life overhauled, we have identified some additional "holes" where money was "leaking out" of our budget. With us cutting back in so many areas, some folks have seen to it to bless us with a little here or there (or A LOT) right when we needed it. Much like a Pentecostal handshake - which I've learned in the last few years is passing money inconspicuously from your hand to another's as a gift via a handshake.

For example, we haven't eaten out...at all... in over 3 weeks. That's a BIG deal to us - especially to me who now is cooking 3 meals a day 7 days a week! LOL No McDonald's. No stopping for juice and a snack for the Vikings amid a morning of errand-running. No date nights. Nothing. So, my mom...the ever-providing grandma...sent the Vikings gift certificates...for McDonalds! Wa-hoo!

Well, today my curtain climbers and I were out running errands and found ourselves just wrapping them up at 12:45pm! Yikes! They were little troopers considering on a normal day they would have eaten lunch and be getting ready for "quiet time" (you can't use the "nap" word around Flicka LOL) at this point in the day. So, I treated them to McD's as a result of Grandma's blessing.

While we munched on two Happy Meals between the three of us (neither Viking usually finishes one meal independently), a man approached our table. He looked about my age, maybe younger. Clean cut but "dusty" - perhaps he was a dry-waller, a contractor, something like that. He says to me with a smile - as I'm wiping ketchup off the table, the chair, Pojke, and every other surface within 30 yards - "you don't happen to shop at Toys R Us, do you?"

I chuckled. Normally, we don't. The closest one is over 30 minutes away and, up until recently when it occurred to me Flicka will be F-O-U-R in the spring, we've still been more of a Babies R Us family. But, knowing what he was getting at, I said, "sure, why?"

And, he hands me $10 in coupons for Toys R Us!

McD's apparently has started their "Monopoly" promotion again. And, he had collected five $1 off and one $5 coupon for anything at a TRU store...even online! Wa-hoo!

I must have said thank you a dozen times. He just smiled and walked away. I'm not sure if he realizes the difference that could make in getting a little something for the Vikings but God knows. And, I know God will bless that man for reaching out and sharing what he had...even if it was a stack of Monopoly pieces! *wink*