3 AM Prayers...

The past month of my life has felt somewhat surreal.  Over 5 weeks ago, we received our referral, and I am still somewhat in shock.  I have woken up every night for the past 5 weeks between 3am and 5am, thinking about my son who sleeps half way around the world.  As I attempt to fall back asleep, I find my heart heavy/excited/anxious/wired.  I think about his caretakers who are essentially taking care of our son until we become a forever family.  I think about the crib he is sleeping in...wondering if he sleeps soundly each night.  I think try to imagine what the day will look like when we meet him for the first time.  I imagine what it will feel like to push him in a stroller down the sidewalk for the first time.  And I have thought a lot about his birth mom.  It's overwhelming.

I find myself praying a lot during those moments where sleep doesn't even seem an option.  I find myself praying that God would just surround our little one with his love, grace and care.  I pray that God would use the caretakers and somehow "be" his love to our little one.  I pray that Nate and I would be the parents that God is calling us to be.  And I pray for his birth mom...that she would experience the love of God in an unbelievable way in her own journey.  They are big prayers.  They are my heart.

Today we spent time doing something that I have only dreamed about for the past 7 years of my life.  We began to prepare a nursery.  My mother-in-law is here for 2 weeks and has been the most amazing help we could have asked for.  She has woken up every morning asking what she can do to help.  Nate took the day off from work today, and the three of us set out to choose colors for the nursery.  After settling on brown and blue (thankfully, my mother-in-law was here and pulled for the blue color with me...otherwise it would have been a very neutral boring brown!), we purchased our paint and began the adventure.

I sat on the floor with a container of baby blue paint and a paint brush and just began to look around the empty room that would soon be shaped into a room that would hold the child we have been praying for, for the past 7 years of our life.  I looked at the closet that already has little boy outfits hanging up, and I was overwhelmed.  I began to cry right then and there.  Man...even as I am writing this, the tears are there.  I am overwhelmed by God's faithfulness throughout this journey.

This journey is something that I could have never imagined for my life.  Every day, every hour, every minute, I find myself more and more grateful for what God has given us through our journey.  I have experienced grief and sadness beyond what I thought I could handle (and trust me, it has only been with the help of God himself that I handled it).  I have experienced a stretching, shaping, and breaking that I didn't think I could survive.  I have experienced highs and lows in a story that I could have never written for myself, even if I tried.  And I have experienced a joy that is indescribable.  This is just the beginning...and I am beyond grateful.

So, as I lay awake tonight, sometime between 3am and 5am (and trust me, I will be), I will be praying once again.  I will be praying for the caretakers who are loving on my child.  I will be praying for his birth mom wherever she may be for whatever she may be experiencing in her heart.  I will be praying for the chapters of our parenting years that God has already written.  And I will be praying for our son, half way around the world, sleeping in a small orphanage in Ethiopia, who in the months to come will be rocked for the very first time in a nursery, that is no longer a dream.