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The Rachel Fund:
Remembering the Lavalley family's ‘Angel’

Occasionally — just occasionally — Barbara Lavalley feels the door to her home will open and her daughter Rachel will come in from playing with friends, just as she used to.

Sometimes Rachel's father, Jeff, or brothers, Ryan and Randy, also think her contagious laughter will be heard throughout their home.

This isn't a case of the supernatural. Far from it: It is a case of a deep, abiding love. Rachel, a precious little seven-year-old girl who changed lives inside and outside her family, died very suddenly of a vicious, unusual viral infection in January 1996. It was an unspeakable loss in the close-knit Lavalley family.

Photographs of Rachel line the walls of the home. Her drawings are nearby. Her memory is recalled with special smiles, thoughts and words. It is not possible for many to feel the depth of loss this family has suffered.

But, the family members don't live in the past. They want to share Rachel's special qualities. By starting and funding what they call "The Rachel Fund" at the Foundation for the Tri-State Community, the Lavalleys sponsor two $500 scholarships, book donations to the library, and a special $100 award to a child "who has made a difference in others' lives" at Our Lady of Fatima School in Huntington, WV.

They knew, deep in their hearts, the memory of Rachel should not fade. After their daughter's sudden death, a friend told them about the Foundation for the Tri-State, and how, as a community foundation, it could assist in setting up a restricted endowment fund.

Rachel's own likes are seen in the scholarships and special gifts the endowment funds.

"She loved to read and write stories, and that is why the gifts to the library are made. There are several books in the library now, with a small photo of Rachel inside the cover," says her mother.

"Rachel was a sensitive girl, and was the one the other girls at school could confide in," she says. "She was a good listener."

"But she also loved to draw and to dress up. She was the one who always was trying to make us more active," recalls her father. "She packed a lot of life into her seven years."

"Rachel was a very spiritual child and one all the other kids loved," says Mrs. Margaret Muth, her second grade teacher. "She loved animals and had a very genuine heart toward people. She was way beyond her years as a second grader."

Looking back at Rachel's life, the family remembers her as drawing self-portraits, but as an angel. After learning about orcas (whales) and how they stay in family units, she gave each member of the Lavalley family an "orca name." "She gave herself the name 'Angel,'" Jeff recounts.

Building the endowment fund for their green-eyed, golden brown-haired

angel has not been easy. But others have helped, too. For example, the school allows the family to "take over the cafeteria" twice a month for special lunches, which they cater. Stewarts Hot Dogs and Taco Bell have provided food at special rates that help this project. Special crafts made by the children are sold at spaghetti dinners at the school. Half the proceeds go to the fund. The Lavalleys and friends even sold extra crafts at Wal-Mart last November and, through a matching program, Wal-Mart will provide a $500 check for the fund. In addition, special animal print t-shirts and specially made baskets are sold for the fund.

"She changed so many lives. She could reach into your heart and still does. Her light is still out there," says her father.

Rachel's Red Birds

Once upon a time two baby birds lived with their mother. They were cardinals, as bright as red roses. One day their mother asked them if they wanted to learn how to fly. They both said yes!

So their mother started to flap her wings and showed them how to fly. One baby bird trying to fly, fell from the tree, but his mother caught him with her beak just in time! The other little baby bird flapping his wings tried to fly but kept dropping down, down, lower, and lower until his mother bumped him up with her head and started him flying through the air softly. Then she made the first baby bird try again. And soon they could both fly by themselves.

Then they grew up and married blue jays and had red, white, and blue baby birds.

By Rachel Lavalley, 1995