On Saturday, August 6, 1PM-5PM, a lemonade stand will be at 9229 Lawyers Rd. All proceeds will go directly to local Foster care children. “Lifeline” has generously offered to match the amount of money raised. Everything is $1, lemonade, hot dogs, and chips!
Donations of new shoes, clothes, book bags, stuffed animals, and journals will be appreciated. Anything you would image a child, that has just been removed from their home, put in an unknown place, with nothing of their own, would need.
Mint Hill’s Veronica Boden, Child Advocate
I am a weekly volunteer at two different Child advocacy homes/facilities for children in foster care here in Charlotte. Every Monday I go to Alexander Youth Network as a lunch buddy/mentor. Following that, I go to Thompson Children’s Home and volunteer my time there. I have met amazing children and people that are compassionate and caring for all of these children in our foster care system.
My heart breaks for these kids, and my heart has grown because of these kids. They have endured more in their short lives than most adults and they continue to inspire me in my journey. Just when I think I had a rough day, every Monday I am reminded that it could be so much worse. I look at these kids and some I know their stories, some I do not. But I do know that they do not have loving parents, they do not have a safe warm home, they do not have constant friends, they do not have a mommy to lean on, or a daddy to play ball with. They do not have their siblings to annoy or play with.
Many siblings are split apart. These kids wake up either in a temporary foster home or group home and take a taxi to this school/residential facility or they live there 24/7. Many of these kids are taken from their home with nothing of their own, and forced to begin new.
Many children in foster care are placed in many different homes, many different times throughout any given year.
These kids have taught me to be grateful and never take a day for granted, whether it is good or bad. I want to bring awareness to these children that live right down the street from us here in Mint Hill.
This is not even a slight percentage of the children worldwide in foster care. However, it has to start somewhere, there has to be a change in the world. These kids are our future, and the more we ignore the fact that they need love, care, clothes, food, shelter, the less of a chance they will grow up as adults getting attention in the wrong way.
The kids need many things, but I know first, they need someone to step in and say they care about them. I eventually want my own agency one day, in hopes of keeping siblings together, and teaching these children/young adults life skills before they are pushed out into the scary world when they turn 18.
Each week, nearly 60,000 children in the United States are reported as abused or neglected. About 520,000 of those children end up in foster care each year — double the number 25 years ago. Approximately 800,000 children every year come in contact with the foster care system.
On average, children stay in the system for almost three years (31 months) before either being reunited with their families or adopted. Almost 20 percent wait five years or more. Children have on average three different foster care placements. Frequent moves in and out of the homes of strangers can be profoundly unsettling for children, and it is not uncommon to hear of children who have been in 20 or 30 different homes. Many have been separated not only from their parents, but from their siblings.
I could go on and on about the sadness of this but I hope with this event, more people will get an idea of what it truly is like and how we as a society are failing not only the children but the future. These kids are our future, and if nobody steps in, they are only going to suffer even more.
THE MISSION OF LIFELINE :The Mission of Lifeline Children’s Services is to equip the body of Christ to manifest the gospel to orphaned and vulnerable children.
