Ten years later

Fast forward about 10 years. Kris and I are at church dropping off our two kids (at the time) in the preschool area and I see my friend, Michael, in. the. hall. In a few minutes we were catching up during Sunday School and I was seeing first hand where his journey was landing. He had gone on to graduate from college, obtain his doctorate, marry a lovely gal, and have a lively son. Life was moving on and he was securing a position to return the love extended to him. The big news? They were moving to our town to begin a grass roots effort and develop a children's home in our community!


Since that initial run in at church - Michael, his family, and his supporters have worked tirelessly raising funds, locating and purchasing property, mobilizing volunteers, raising funds, hiring staff, accepting referrals, raising funds, educating our community, making presentations, and did I mention raising funds?!?



In March Homes of Hope for Children was accepted to participate in the Pepsi Refresh Project. They were in the running for $250,000. They solicited voters with e-mail addresses to go to the website every day and vote. They wanted/needed the money to finish building the first cottage in hopes of being ready to serve children during the summer. After 30 days of signing-in the tallies were totaled and Homes of Hope was notified they had won! What a day of rejoicing. The reality of a finished cottage was on the horizon and children in need were going to have their needs met!

This story will take several posts to tell...please stay tuned to see how it turns out!

**The details of this story are told from memory. I did my best to recount the way the story unfolded.**