Part one of My trip to Lovely!

To Meet Lovely Roseline~
November 2010
I am sure each person’s journey to meet their child in an Orphanage in another country is very unique and mine is no exception. I believe we all share many of the same feelings, but we are all coming from such different places it makes the experience so different. It would take me 24 hours from the time I leave our home in Oregon until I would arrive at the Orphanage in Haiti, and I would not sleep any of those 24 hours.
For me I would travel to Haiti for the second time. The first time I was in Haiti my oldest daughter was at my side, and my second daughter who was born in Haiti and my oldest son were home with Dad. Never could I have processed that the next time I would come to this country both my daughters would now be in Heaven living with Jesus and I would be about to meet the next daughter the same Jesus has chosen to bless me with! The range of emotions is almost unbearable at times! I wish so much my daughter Dannielle was with me again on this trip! I am meeting up with a mission team in Florida to travel the rest of the way with them and the team is mostly made up of beautiful young girls just like Dannielle anxious to board the plane for their first adventure to another land, another world, another time. I hurt so much to think I am returning to Johanna’s country but not with her as we had always planned! We planned we would travel with her to show her the country she was born in and to show those who had cared for her and wondered if she would even live that she had…………and live she did for 5 glorious years!
I am somewhat sure that the team members are unsure of me as we first meet since I am quiet and reserved, but can not tell them it is because of ALL that I have been through in the last 10 years. We arrive in Haiti and the rush and hustle of being in a third world country hits me as soon as we step off the plane! It would not take long to realize that the first thing I would deal with was that my suitcase did not arrive.  My suitcase full of medical supplies from Anthony who is also now in Heaven and no longer needs these supplies, and all the things I brought to leave at the Orphanage. My suitcase with diapers, and wipes, and toys for my baby girl to play with was somewhere, but not here in Haiti with me!
I travel in the back of a “dump truck” with a whole group of girls and women I have just met and I see firsthand how the country that was in such desperate need and poverty 11 years ago is now somehow incredibly worse. I see with my own eyes the tarp after tarp after tarp in what the call the “Tent Cities” and can not believe this is an improvement from what things had first been like after the earthquake. Everyone is chattering away and it all sounds kind of deafening to me as my mind is tired, and all I can really think about now is “I am about to meet my baby girl, I am about to hold her in my arms!”
Arriving at the Creche (Orphanage) is not at all what I expect it to be like. Because I am arriving with a large mission team there is much going on, and all I am wanting now is to find my baby! After a few minutes of trying to figure things for myself I finally have to ask someone where the nursery is, and if I can go there. They point the way for me and say yes I can go there…..and I think I will be led there, or she will be brought to me, but no- I go, alone. Walking in the room I see babies all around me and woman (nannies) looking at me unsure of why I am there, and all I can do is get the words “Roseline” out of my mouth. Then I try my Creole “I am her Mama, she is my child.” And they smile at my attempt at Creole and untie a tie on the side of a double decker crib and pick up a gorgeous baby girl and say to me “Roseline”. I scoop her up and she actually grabs on to me for dear life and buries her head into my hair, and I cry. I try my best to communicate that I am going to take her with me and I need diapers and wipes because my suitcase did not make it there, they give me 3 diapers and 5 wipes and I go to find out way back to my room
She holds on to me so tight and I love it so much to finally be touching her! We lay down together on the bed, I do not change her clothes or wash her up or any of the things I thought I would do. She just lays on my chest holding on so tight, and we both collapse into sleep~wonderful sleep!