How It All Gets Started

Wonder Women, Jamie & Ali McMutrie, are slowly taking in new children for care, and so proceeds their Nouvo Vilaj.  As papers are processed and designs made reality, these ladies live and work out of a rented house doing what they love best -- nurturing wee ones to health.  I borrow here from fabulous, comedic, Pittsburgh blogger, Virginia Montanez, (http://thatschurch.com/)  .  .  ."Speaking of babies, ladies, hold on to your ovaries and check out this picture Jamie and Ali McMutrie sent from Haiti of one of the children they care for down there:"

"As Jeff said recently in an episode of Chuck, 'I think my water just broke.' ”

Our adoption journey began with a picture -- of a little girl at a Missionaries of Charity (Mother Theresa) orphanage in Haiti  .  .  .   my Mom side-tripped to the facility on her first adventure into the mountainous land.  Six months later, the wee child's beaming smile was too much for me to ignore.

We learned, months later, that the girl we'd come to call "Sunflower" had been a temporary resident -- there only for medical care -- who went home to her birth family.  May she continue to grow and blossom! 

And so, we were then open to a referral from BRESMA orphanage, and thus, Josianna and Wendy entered our lives for ten months of love and growth -- for all of us.  A life-changing earthquake led their birth parents to retrieve them from orphanage care and make their way to safety in village life far from the confines of Port-au-Prince.  We continue to make efforts to get to them messages and mementos as symbols of our love and respect for their family and blessings of health, hope, and happiness for now and for their future.

With dedicated hearts, committed souls, and prepared minds, we yearn to bring into our family Haitian children who need us  .  .  .  children who have no prospect of family care otherwise, and thus, we work tirelessly for the release from authority of the US government children who were re-institutionalized in Pittsburgh, nearly nine months ago.

The 26-month journey has been an indescribable, invaluable growth experience .  .  and as we teeter on the brink of news (yes, a decision, finally) any day, any moment, I realize that this has been one hell of a labor.   

Yet, the McMutries love child after child after child, and have made this their lives.  Around the clock.  Through quake, fear, and deaths.  Endless bureaucracy and numbing numbers in need.  For love of the most vulnerable.  For life.