Last Week in Pictures

Watching the Super Bowl

So sweet! Claire and Abram's relationship continues to grow. Several times this past week she picked him up and put him on her lap to read to him. Makes my heart happy!

 Wearing "nakeds" and playing "guitars" would probably sum up this last week for the boys.

 Thursday night we went to Kate's to hang out and eat dinner. The girls cleared the furniture so they could dance to music. Their dancing then turned into this . . .

 And then this . . .

(Brady, the only one missing, jumped in on the next round.)

Hanging out with my sister in her kitchen listening to loud laughter and shouts of happiness from all the kids playing together has got to be one of my favorite things on earth right now. Thankful for that gift this week. 

Six Strategies for Building Attachment

Our agency, MLJ Adoptions, published a good, short blog post recently called, "Six Strategies for Building Attachment" that is worth reading if you haven't read anything on attachment. It is pretty basic, but basics are good!

Isaiah Munanga Taylor Lee

Since I was not able to post our referral pictures or any pictures we received of the kids before they came home, I've been meaning to post them for some time. Today I'm posting Isaiah's. I have experienced God's grace just going back and looking at these pictures and remembering what He has done in Isaiah's life in a short three months to begin to restore his heart and bring LIFE into his little body.

I haven't looked at these first referral pictures (October 2010) in awhile. Now that I know Isaiah well, it  nearly wrenched my insides to see them and see how incredibly sad, scared and hurting my little boy was. 

Here are the second set of pictures we got in November 2010.

 December 2010. He is swimming in the 2T clothes we sent him.

July 2011. His first and only smile (out of all the pictures while he was in foster care). I will never forget how my heart swelled inside of me when I saw these pictures of him smiling.

July 2011 in some other clothes we sent him.

September 2011. Looking more like the boy I know.

October 28, 2011 at the airport right after he arrived.

A few weeks later.

One of my favorite recent pictures of my little man.

And just for comparison sake:

Praise. The. Lord. Thank you, Jesus, for bringing life and healing and love to Isaiah's life!

Just in the last week or so, I've noticed a big increase in Isaiah's confidence, which I am praising God for. Last Friday, when I was having a very hard day with one of the girls, Isaiah - for the first time - used really good words to ask me something he needed or wanted . . . which is major progress. He said, "mom, outside please?" and then later, "help please, mom." Seems like such a minor thing, but knowing how much he struggled to know he could use his words to get his needs met, much less use the words, makes this a huge victory. His English is growing leaps and bounds now, too.

There is still much healing to be done in his life, but God is doing it! What a privilege to get to be part of God's restoration of his life. I can't wait to see all that Isaiah will be when God is finished healing him.