A Thought About Prayer

Prayer is something I struggle with. I have a strong desire to be seeking “God’s will,” which makes it really hard to pray my will. I know that God isn’t supposed to be some wishing well where we deposit long lists of special requests and demands. Meanwhile, I know that we are allowed, expected and encouraged to share our hearts with Him, So, it is in this spirit of sharing my heart with God, that I have prayed the following prayers regarding our baby:

1) Initially, we decided we would be happy to be placed with a child of either gender. As the years went by, and we became more deeply immersed in all things boy, the growing desire in my heart was to have a daughter. I quietly prayed for this, in addition to praying that if he chose otherwise, it would be equally awesome, albeit amusing. God, Thanks for sending me a girl.

2) Initially, I prayed that we would go to a province that would be near Beijing, so we would have the opportunity to tour the Great Wall on our trip, and see many of the sights that we witnessed during the Olympics. Recently though, as we have realized that our travel would occur in mid-winter, the prayers have changed drastically to have our daughter in an area that would have a mild temperature to increase our comfort level while in China, and increase our chances of avoiding weather related travel delays. God, thanks for sending us to Nanching, and enabling us to avoid the Beijing weather.

3) We prayed for a child as young as possible, because attachment and related issues become more difficult for the children as they age. Also, my favorite baby age is 9-18 months, and I really prayed that I would not miss much during this time period. God, thanks for matching us with a child that isn’t 8 months old yet.

4) We prayed that Princess Peach would be in foster care or in an orphanage with a Half The Sky Center. Half the Sky is a non-profit organization that sends nannies to the orphanages regularly to interact and play with the children. Although it is too soon to know if Princess Peach is in the program, she is in an orphanage with a Half The Sky Center.

In addition, I have noticed a few extra bonus blessings, that I never thought to pray for:

• Every family with our same match date that I had made a personal connection with prior to receiving our referral has children in the same orphanange as Princess Peach, even ones with different agencies. We will definitely be travelling with the ones from our agency, and hope to travel at the same time as the ones from different agencies.
• Daddy Kong and I were able to be together at the time of the referral phone call because it came on a day when he had previously scheduled a vacation day.
• We were able to be with Daddy Kong's parents when we received our phone call, and the our friends from PA (who also happened to be with us when we received the call that we were accepted for adoption by our agency in 9/05) when we opened up her picture.
• After receiving the referral phone call on Disney Property, we can now claim a perfect record of meeting, getting engaged, married, and receiving a baby on Disney Property.