Villages of Hope Trip: 2/19

The photo above is the apartment that I helped to decorate back in October 2015. Returning to this place meant more to me than I could possibly put into words and having the opportunity to bring my husband, Marc, was just amazing. I returned for a number of reasons; Marc needed to see each campus to understand the scope of services offered through Place of Hope and Villages of Hope, we both needed to meet with Josh, the director of Place of Hope and to further discuss the important practices we would like to incorporate at The Open Door House. During our two-day visit we toured 3 campuses, met with their clinical director, campus manager, director of advancement and had a conference call with the CEO. We left with our heads spinning and hearts bursting, eager to get back home and start working. This trip reaffirmed my dream of having a campus setting similar to theirs, with the addition of some sort of retail attached where our residents can work to learn a skill, as well as have a business that can help to generate income for our foundation (think The King’s Kitchen in Charlotte- love these guys!). So very thankful that the Lord led me to the Villages of Hope over 3 years ago, thankful that Josh, the staff and the CEO are incredibly generous with information and knowledge to help us advance our mission. This journey has been by far, the most difficult undertaking of my life. What keeps me going? Knowing that there are 11,000 kids currently in foster care and each year more than 500 of them will age out and 20% will become instantly homeless. It keeps me up at night and I won’t rest until we have our first house.