Nothing Ordinary

Hi Everyone,
It's been a long time I know. I am just so not a faithful blog poster. To be honest I was actually thinking of ending the blog because I felt like we are just a normal family now and nobody wants to read about our life now that we are home. However, I received a call today from my wonderful Aunt Candice telling me I had to update the blog and how she and other family love to read it. So Aunt Candice I finally have another post. It's a long one though!

As I started to think about our "normal family" I realized it is anything but ordinary and what God has done is anything but normal. Jon and I sat down the other night to watch our Ethiopia video footage and the Talo we saw in the video was unrecognizable. We both just stared in awe as we looked back to see a much smaller, Talo with gross motor delays and a very tiny vocabulary of Amharic words. His whole personality was just so hard to look back on. We saw a timid little guy who horded his new toys in a bag so no one would take them and who was obsessed with shoes because he has never owned his own pair. We watched the first time he experienced a bath and how overwhelming it was for him to have clean water just falling out of the faucet. In his first weeks with us he was obsessed with drinking water, touching water and holding water bottles. His life as an orphan was so clearly seen in his behaviors and actions in those videos. As we watched we also saw how much of a stranger he was to us and the lack of trust he had for us in our first weeks together.

Tomorrow marks 4 months from the day we were untied with Talo and the growth and progress he has made is amazing. Truly all the glory, credit and reasoning for who he has become in these four months all goes to God! Praise you LORD for you have done this! In these four months Talo has grown several inches, exploded in his vocabulary and learning of the English language, goes to the bathroom almost independently , can count to almost 20, is learning color's and shapes, and loves to help Mommy or Daddy do anything! He has also has learned how to say good bye to others without it causing a panic trauma moment because of all goodbyes he has had to say in his little life.

Talo is our table setter at dinner time and he loves to get to play in the kitchen sink! He hasn't lost that love for water! We also see his bedtime routine getting so much better as his anxiety level has gone down so much at night and he has learned all the songs I sing to him as I lay with him each night at bedtime.

Two nights ago he sang along with me as I sang "Give Me Jesus", "There's Just something about that name", and "Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus". Oh tears just filled my eyes as I couldn't believe Talo had learned all the words and was singing back to me "Master, Savior, Jesus, let all heaven and earth proclaim". Truly adoption is such a miracle from God. As I write these posts I can make our life sound very romanticized but hear me clearly we have many very "normal days" where we play with his cars, or blocks, or puzzles for hours. There are times where I don't have lots of patience and Talo is pressing every button he knows to press! Yet every night when I sit down and Talo is finally asleep I can't help but think that what God has done is anything but ordinary. It is truly Extraordinary and Adoption really is a miracle.

Here are some recent pictures from the Christmas season and I posted our first ever picture of Talo at the Top of it. . .

People always say "I can't see God, He isn't at work, He isn't real." However, I can't help but wonder maybe they are looking in all the wrong places. God's heart is for the broken, the weak, the lost, the poor, the widow and the orphan. He is at work in the fields of the fatherless. He is at work to bring the broken, lost orphan without a name or home into families. Yet our American Christianity is all about "ME and I". It is all about "our small group", a polished hip Sunday morning service that will make "ME" feel good, sermons of how Jesus can make "My life better", and quiet times with the LORD that do not last longer than 15 minutes so as not to interfere with "My" busy schedule. I would bet to say that the American Church spends more time on face book, their cell phone, or the TV than they do in God's Word. I feel like American Christianity is like trying to make Jesus fit into an application on the iPhone. I believe we have it all wrong as a society, God is never going to be seen working in a Christianity all about "self help" and how to make "our lives" as comfortable as possible. Jesus’ message doesn't fit into face book or an iPhone application. And it is hard to find God working when we can't look beyond having a "comfortable life". Maybe we have it all wrong in American Christianity today?

I say this because why does it take an earth quake in Haiti to open the eyes of Christians in America to the plight of a third world country? Haiti has been suffering long before this earthquake hit and orphans have been going hungry and thirsty there for years, not just these past few days.

As you look at the pictures of Talo know this: there are an estimated 147 million orphans in the world. In Ethiopia alone there are 4.6 million orphans. What are you going to do about it? If you are a Christian you do not have an option to ignore this question. For what does Jesus say in Matthew 25:31-46? Vs 43-45

"I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick and in prison, and you did not visit me.'"Then they will answer, 'Lord when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?'"Then he will answer them, 'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.' Matthew 25:43-45

We can only make excuses for so long.

One of our Referal Pictures of Talo June 11, 2009. Talo so tiny here yet so much better. In March 2009 he weighed only 15lbs. Do See God at work now?


Talo holding his first Christmas Tree!

Talo Decorating Christmas Cookies!


Talo's reaction as we brought him to his gifts on Christmas Eve. Me handing him the Christmas card we made him. Notice his reaction. I was filled with tears.


Our First Christmas. Only a few small gifts but "Jesus's Birthday" is what Talo will tell you Christmas is really about!


Talo and Daddy! Talo Loves his Daddy!


Talo Loved his Christmas Present from Great Grandma and Grandpa Heidebrink!He calls it his "Duck Blanket". This is Christmas at Jon's Parents House!


Talo helping Grandma H, open her gifts!


Talo opening gifts from Grandma and Grandpa Johns!


Times after Christmas.Me holding frozen corn on Talo's head after he did a swan dive into the corner of the night stand!


Mommy wishing it was summer time! (and no I didn't ask him to pose like that)!


Day to Day life, Play Dough creations in his favorite pajama's right before bed!