Haiti, Evansville create family bonds...

What a delight to see this in the paper this morning:

Haiti, Evansville create family bonds
Nine Evansville-area families plan to adopt Haitian orphans
By Susan Orr (Contact)
Thursday, October 25, 2007

When Angela and Shawn Collins of Evansville traveled to Angel House orphanage in Haiti last year, their intent was to visit the children and volunteer there.

The couple wanted children but had put the idea aside after experiencing the pain of several miscarriages.

But, Angela Collins said, God had a different plan. While at Angel House, she found herself drawn to two children. She told her husband, who said he also felt a connection with them.

After praying about it and talking to the children, they decided to begin the adoption process for Steven and Belle, both 9.

"I never thought I'd go to an orphanage and decide to adopt two 9 year olds. ... I have no idea how to explain it. It was God," she said.

(Coincidentally, a few months after that Haiti visit, Angela learned she was pregnant. The Collinses' daughter, Madelyn, was born in July.)

The Collinses are among nine Evansville-area families who are in the process of adopting a total of 17 Angel House children, ages infant to 9. Located in Port-au-Prince, Angel House cares for children who have been abandoned, orphaned or brought in by parents too poor to care for them.

If the adoptions proceed on schedule, the first of the children will arrive by Christmas, with all of them here by Christmas 2008.

The Angel House adoption network has grown through word-of-mouth.

Michelle Cundiff of Evansville, a friend of Angela Collins, is missions leader for Three Angels Children's Relief, the agency that runs the orphanage, a Christian school and a medical clinic. She and her husband, Jeremy, are in the process of adopting three children.

"It is unusual for so many families to be adopting from the same orphanage, especially since Haiti isn't necessarily a hot spot to adopt from," Cundiff wrote in an e-mail interview. "We attribute this to God."

Another family, Kathy and Randy Koenig of Newburgh, is working to adopt three children: Shakira, 5, Samara, 3, and Caleb, 5 months old. Those children will join Phoebe, 4, whom the Koenigs adopted as an infant in North Carolina.

The Koenigs attend Lutheran Church of Our Redeemer, and the church will host a benefit concert Friday at 7 p.m. to help raise money for the family's adoption expenses.

The Koenigs heard about Angel House through church friends who are adopting two children from there.

Kathy Koenig's connection with the children began online. She was looking at the orphanage's Web site and saw Samara's photo. The little girl had the same birthday as Phoebe, the same gap-toothed grin and the same love of dance and music.

Randy noticed the similarities, too.

"We just knew we were meant to adopt Samara," Kathy said.

In months to come, the couple decided to adopt the two other children.

The couple traveled to Haiti in July to visit the children and meet their biological mothers.

For Kathy, the experience was emotional. For Randy, it was a confirmation they were doing God's will.

"I knew that these children needed me," Randy said.

The Koenigs estimate all three adoptions should be complete between December and February. In the meantime, they're preparing for the new arrivals.

Photographs of the children hang on the walls, and the Koenigs regularly send family pictures to Angel House. The Koenigs are learning to speak some Creole, and they are collecting Haitian recipes.

As the families wait, they have gotten to know each other.

Cundiff hosts a weekly mothers' prayer gathering, and the families plan to stay in touch.

"We feel extremely blessed that the children will be able to continue the friendships they have formed in the orphanage," Cundiff wrote.






DENNY SIMMONS / Courier & Press
Phoebe Koenig, 4, right, does her best to comfort Eva Brown, 3, sitting in her mother, Theresa Brown's lap. Eva was having a tough time during their Sunday school music class at Lutheran Church of Our Redeemer in Evansville. Theresa Brown and her husband Don are one of the sets of parents who will be adopting a child from Haiti in the near future. Eva's country of birth is China.

DENNY SIMMONS / Courier & Press
The current Koenig family of Newburgh, Phoebe, 4, Randy and Kathy, get together for a worship service after their Sunday school classes at Lutheran Church of Our Redeemer recently. The family will soon double with the addition of Shakira, 5, Samara, 3, and Caleb, 5 months.