A surprise Birthday Party!

Yeah! Mom was really surprised for her 60th Birthday. Dad arranged for us all to meet at Anthony's for a Sunday Brunch.
Julie and I comparing our belly's

A girls pic

Thanks Dan and Sue and Gary and Izzi for coming all the way to Spokane for the surprise. We all had a lot of fun!

The World's Children

This photoblog shows pictures of just a few of the world's impoverished children. CLICK HERE.

(HT: Challies.com)

How 'Where's Waldo' can help me understand the Bible

My 3 year old son loves books & more specifically, ‘Where’s Waldo?’. He loves observing, searching, & looking for Waldo as if he was Sherlock Holmes in search of the missing clue to solve a mystery. There are countless people, doing countless things, with countless things occurring on each page. Ezra tells me, ‘Daddy, look. That man is throwing a baseball [not just a ball], she is holding a green purse [not just a purse], the boy is crying because he got hit [not just crying]. He observes with intense detail.

As a book lover myself, I am overjoyed in Ezra’s love for books. Yet, after reading “Agassiz and the Fish” I realized that my son observes Where’s Waldo? with greater inquiry, depth, and intensity than I often do when I open the very Word of God in search of His illumination, understanding, and God-given insight for the good of my soul.


At 3 years old, Ezra is learning how to observe pictures & words and eventually sentences, which are within in paragraphs with are in complete letters which fit into the whole of Scripture. I am grateful and exhorted with this privilege to help him learn to observe, read, and understand the Bible in the God-wrought hope that he would, by the grace of God, comprehend and have illumination of the ‘sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus’ (2 Tim. 3:15).

What a privilege to have the Scriptures, and may I chew upon, dig into and study the Scriptures as my 3 year old son does with Where’s Waldo?!

Fall photos & Costumes

Heidi took the kids to a fall festival party tonight. They gave the kids some cupcakes and lots of candy. Here is a pic of Olivia sharing her cupcake with Ezra once they got back home. Oh yea, she ate all of the frosting off and then wanted to share the cupcake with Ezra.

We picked up lots of leaves today. I put Ezra and Olivia in the garbage cans to help smash 'em down. They had lots of fun...Ezra thought he was Oscar the Grouch. (The house we recently moved into is in the background).

Ezra the Pumpkin and Olivia the Clown. They loved dressing up and having some fun together.

Smashing leaves down for daddy

Oh my the kids were so excited when they figured out if they worked together they could give mommy a ride in their wagon!!! Mommy was pretty excited about it also!

Need I say anything about this.

She absolutely loves her bath time

Ear to ear smiles!!!

A trip away from the chaos

So a few days after moving into our new house we decided to get away from the chaos and make a trip over to Bothel to visit Nick and Julie's new place. (And to celebrate Heidi and Julie's birthday since they're so close together) We had a great time relaxing, catching up, seeing where Nick works as the new manager, and visiting Canyon Hills Community Church with them. We actually stayed with a Sawatzky family friend, Jeanne Ryan, because she had more room to house us. It's funny because Saturday we all took naps and watched college football. We didn't go out and visit any place, we just kicked back and relaxed indoors. It was just what we needed after having to pack up and move with one weeks notice. By the way, thanks to all the people who graciously helped us move!
Heidi and Julie with Jeanne. She used to babysit the girls when they were little and is now like another sister. We love you Jeanne!
Pictures of the new house to come soon. . . . . . . . . . .

'Do Lord, O Do Lord, O do remember Me'

Ezra loves the sound 'Do Lord'. He was putting on a little concert for us. Sometimes he sings is very softly and it sounds great...and then other times he kind of 'screams' it...this is one of those screaming times. It is really fun to watch him like to sing so much!

Modern Day Foot-Washing

Ethiopian Orphan Video

2 years ago today & a prayer for our son

2 years ago today was the day we first met our son, Ezra.

This was one of the first pictures we received from our adoption agency in December of 2006. Ezra was about 3 months old when this picture was taken.


Our first chance to hold our son
Tearful thankfulness of the Lord's goodness to us

Back at our hotel, Ezra was fast asleep and we were staring at him wondering, 'Is he always going to sleep like this? Is he always going to be this calm? What is his personality going to be like?' (2 years later: No, he will rarely sleep like this, he is rarely calm and he has a lively personality)

Heidi holding Ezra after he had woken up from his first nap with us.

Ezra first experience with Heidi's baked french toast

Ezra loves the sprinkler

Ezra's penetrating eyes

Ezra and Olivia during Christmas time in 2008.


This is a good picture that sums up Ezra's personality on most days.

A Prayer for our son:

2 years ago today the Lord graciously blessed us and placed you 'Abera' into our family. We renamed you Ezra and kept Abera (Amharic meaning for Abera: Lightning, and/or Shining) as your middle name. We named you Ezra because it is our prayer that you be a man of God who studies the Word of God, obeys the Word of God and teaches the Word of God in your pursuit of God. Ezra in the Old Testament was blessed by a close walk with the Living God of the Universe because 'the good hand of His God was on him'. (Ezra 7:9).

Ezra, our prayer for you is that you would become a man 'who is humble, contrite of spirit, and trembles at the Word of God.' (Is. 66:2) For, God will look upon you with favor and will reveal Himself to you if you cry out to God for humility, contriteness of spirit and an awe of the Word of God. We pray that you would be a man of God who flee's the tempations of this world and a man who delights in God Himself. God has given you an electrifying personality, a winsome smile, a vigor for life unmatched by but a few (your sister rivaling you in this area :) ). May the Lord bless you, keep you, and cause His face to shine upon you. May the Spirit of God dwell within you from a young age, even as the Spirit dwelt in John the Baptist from the womb. May you be drawn to Christ and may your life be spent living for, breathing for, and dying for our Great Redeemer Jesus.

2 years ago today was the beginning of our journey together. We pray you would be a boy and soon a man 'of whom the world is not worthy' (Heb. 11:38), a man who 'risks his life for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ' (Acts 15:26), a man 'who turns the world upside down' (Acts 17:6) because of your undying alligence to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, our Savior Jesus. We are humbled God has made your our son and we pray we would be daily examples of treasuring Christ and living in a way that displays to you that Jesus is our highest joy, our greatest passion, our all-consuming zeal, and the purpose of why we live and die and that we would be able to look you in the eye and say, 'Ezra, follow us as we follow Christ.'

We love you, cherish you and are so thankful you are our son,

Dad and Mom

A little refreshment from the hot weather

Olivia grabbing for the camera
Popsicles for everyone! They were a "hot commodity" in 98 degree weather

Hmmmmmm. . . how does this work?! Every time the water turned off, she'd look around with her hands in the air asking who had done such a thing.

Ezra's getting more and more brave in the water. He's finally starting to catch up with his sister who is fearless.

A Rough Week for Olivia

Last Sunday- Still getting over colds picked up on vacation

Monday- Found Olivia in crib time sucking on the blind string that pulls the drapes up. Noticed a metal piece missing from the tassle and haven't found it since. (I've checked every poopy diaper since and still no sign)

Tuesday- Olivia fell off Ezra's bed head-first. Thankfully, no broken bones. . . . yet.

Wednesday- Had to call poison control because I found Olivia feasting on a tub of Vasaline. Thankfully it's not poisonous, just causes vomiting or diarrhea because it's so greasy.

Thursday- Olivia fell down 3 stairs and ripped the gum part between her two front teeth. Lots of gushing blood:( Poor thing!

Friday- Fell off the tricycle at nanna's house today. Found by mom on her back still clinging to the bike handles up-side-down with bike on top.

Needless to say I'm I little worried about what will happen tomorrow, much less in the next 5 years. But if she makes it alive that long and perhaps without a broken bone, I'll be pleasantly surpised and know she must have a guardian angel. (Did I mention that her mom had 3 broken arms by the time she was ten?)

Please Lord, protect this family

Family 'Vacation' and more news...(Heidi is pregnant)

It has been too long since we posted, but we were suprised by the Lord a few weeks ago to find out that Heidi is pregnant! We were very shocked at first, but equally excited and in awe of God's plans and His workings. We talked to our adoption agency and they told us that we are going to indeed have to put the adoption on hold until after the birth of the baby. We were initially discouraged that our adoption from Ethiopia is going to have to go on hold, but we know the Lord is infinitely wise and His ways are always best. Below are some pictures from some of our time spent up at Loon Lake with extended family. Papa Greenup was able to rent a cabin and was gracious enough extend to us the opportunity to join them up at the lake.
Heidi's due date is: January 20th (or somewhere close to that date).

Woodland Park Zoo & Visiting relatives

Last weekend we took a quick trip to the west side of WA and visited with some family and friends and visited the Zoo. The kids did great and loved seeing the animals...though most of them were lifeless because we got there right after lunch.

The kids loved having 'Uncle' Greg push them around in the wheel-barrow.

These next two pictures were taken 5 minutes after we left the zoo!

If you look closely at Ezra's hand...you'll see he is holding a sea shell he found earlier that day. He later dropped it on a tile floor and that was the end of that.