ST. CHARLES – Annette Schramm of St. Charles has made several mission trips to Haiti and has two adopted children from the country.

It is difficult to comprehend the devastation facing the nation after the recent earthquake, she said, but her experience does not compare with what her children must be feeling.

"I can't imagine what's going on in their heads," she said Thursday.

Schramm and her husband, Fred, adopted Katiana and Evaisson from the King's Garden orphanage in Port-au-Prince when they were 4 and 3.

Their memories of Haiti include the good – mangoes and their friends – and the turbulent – people breaking into the orphanage during hostile times, Schramm said.

They stay connected to the country by annual visits from Haitian doctors they knew through the King's Organization and by three other adopted Haitian children living here, Schramm said.

Now 9 and 8, the siblings are in the fourth and third grade at Ferson Creek Elementary School in St. Charles. Because of their ties to Haiti, the school has focused its charitable efforts this year on the country and King's School, which is associated with the orphanage, Principal Chris Adkins said.

Katiana and Evaisson shared stories about their life in Haiti during an all-school assembly in September. They told humbling stories of eating mud pies to fill the void in their stomachs and chasing chickens in the street, Adkins said.

"We're pretty lucky to have them here, to have this connection," he said.

Proceeds from Ferson Creek's staff volleyball match against Corron Elementary on Tuesday was originally going to help pay for a playground for King's School, Adkins said, but the earthquake has changed the event's scope and focus.

Held at St. Charles North High School, the match is open to the entire St. Charles community and will benefit the American Red Cross' Haiti disaster relief, Adkins said.

Katiana and Evaisson have not returned to their homeland since their adoption, but Schramm said she planned to take them to the grand opening of a hospital in suburban Port-au-Prince this year. The hospital, which Schramm helped raise money for, survived the earthquake, she said.

Although the Schramms have been devastated by the earthquake and have been praying for the safety of everyone they know there, Schramm has hopes for a silver lining.

"We hope this is a turning point for Haiti," she said. "We hope the international community gets extremely involved and turn it around."

The Rev. Steve Good of Sugar Grove United Methodist Church, who has traveled to Haiti with church groups, described the country's poorness.

"It is not a poverty we are even used to when we talk about poverty in the United States," he said. "It's just hard to compare because they have so little. So many people survive on a dollar a day."

Sugar Grove United Methodist Church plans collect money for relief, Good said. He encouraged everyone to donate to the relief effort through an organization they trust.

"That will go a long way toward the Haitians seeing Americans as a country who cares about them," he said.