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For Children in U.S. Foster Care, What Does Permanency Mean?

Holt Senior Vice President Greg Eubanks talks about the ongoing crisis in the U.S. foster care system and what can be done about it.

In the US, some 690,000 children live under the foster care system as of 2017. Around 269,000 of these kids entered the system for the first time that year. These kids can be as young as newborns and as old as 20. Approximately 124,000 of them are waiting to be adopted, while the remainder look forward to reunification with their biological parents. Continue reading “For Children in U.S. Foster Care, What Does Permanency Mean?”

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A Dispatch From The 2019 Korea Gift Team

While traveling on this year’s Korea Gift Team trip with Holt, adoptive mom and donor Seri Boettcher kept a travelogue to tell her friends and family about the programs she visited and the children, families and individuals she met. 

Holt staff member Amanda Baca holds a child in care during the 2019 Korea Gift Team trip.
Holt staff member Amanda Baca holds a child in care during the 2019 Korea Gift Team trip.

Holt Morning Garden Shelter

We travelled back to Seoul yesterday afternoon after a VERY moving morning in Daejeon (where we spent the night) at the Holt-sponsored Achimddeul Mother and Child Shelter. It seems with every Holt trip I’ve taken, there is one day that just hits me emotionally and I truly did not anticipate it would be this day on this trip. Continue reading “A Dispatch From The 2019 Korea Gift Team”

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Why U.S. Kids Need You To Say “Yes”

Children in our U.S. foster care and adoption system are in crisis — sleeping in hotel rooms and repurposed jails for a lack of somewhere to go. They need individuals and families to stand up, and say “yes.”  

In our Seattle area office each day, we receive multiple emails from the State of Washington that briefly describe children who need a place to go. For multiple reasons, some need a placement for only a few days, other need a long-term foster family, and others need an adoptive family. These emails overwhelm me with the sheer volume of need.

One recent Friday, I opened one email to find 57 children listed. We received eight more emails that same day, just like this one. They come every day. Every. Day.

Continue reading “Why U.S. Kids Need You To Say “Yes””

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Care You Can See, Every Day

Before Emerson could go home to her adoptive family, she needed to have heart surgery in China. While recovering, she stayed at Holt’s donor-funded medical foster home in Beijing, where the love and care she received made such a difference — her mom can still see it, every day.

When asked, adoptive mother Rachel Pace admits she doesn’t know a lot about the Peace House in China. Her 2-year-old daughter, Emerson, stayed at Holt’s medical foster home for only a short time. But circumstances surrounding Emerson’s adoption made the journey a bit of a “whirlwind.” Rachel had to learn a lot, in not a lot of time.

“Our adoption happened so quickly,” she says.  “And I didn’t feel like I was really able to learn a lot about the Peace House and the care they provide.” Continue reading “Care You Can See, Every Day”

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To Pray For Him Always

When a heartbreaking event led the Lee family back to Korea, Joshua Lee had the chance to meet a very special woman in his life — the woman who cared for him before he came home to his adoptive family.

Joshua with his foster mother and her new foster baby.
Joshua with his foster mother and her new foster baby. “Was I just like that baby?” Joshua asked his mom as they spent the day reconnecting with his foster mother.

She spent only five months with Joshua, but remembered him when they came face-to-face 11 years later.

“She was so thrilled to see him,” Joshua’s mother, Barbara Lee, says.

She even wore the necklace — a gleaming dark blue and aqua globe hanging from her neck by a beautiful gold chain.  The distance between Korea and Mexico, where the Lee family currently serves as missionaries, was great, but the necklace around her neck made her feel closer to Joshua — and reminded her to pray for him always. Continue reading “To Pray For Him Always”

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Redbox Steps Up to Help Children in Foster Care Come Home

Watch Instant Family on DVD and help Redbox & WACAP

Last fall, the movie Instant Family was released in theaters. Inspired by the writer/director’s own experience as a parent who adopted a sibling group from foster care, the story was a surprisingly honest and unflinching look at the foster care system, both hilarious and heartbreaking.

As we move closer to the April 1st merger of WACAP (World Association of Children and Parents) into the Holt family, we grow increasingly excited about our expanding role in offering solutions for children in foster care, both in Oregon and Washington. We are joining forces to continue our shared mission and quickly finding new ways to share our mission with broader audiences.

Continue reading “Redbox Steps Up to Help Children in Foster Care Come Home”
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That Felt Like a Mother’s Love

After traveling to meet their former foster mothers in Korea, adoptee siblings Emma and Isaiah Perron finally understand what their parents always told them — “You were greatly loved in Korea.” This post written by Lisa Perron — Emma and Isaiah’s mom — originally appeared on catholicfam.org. 

Emma meets her foster mom for the first time since she left Korea to join her family.

The first night our Korean-born son arrived home, he cried for his foster mother. Less than thirty-six hours before, he had woken up in the only home he had ever known, been brought to the Holt International Adoption Services offices, handed to a stranger, and traveled around the world to be placed in our arms. He had never seen us before and had no idea what was happening. After a very stressful first introduction to our dear son, we arrived home late from the airport. Soon the family was all sleeping peacefully in their beds — all except Isaiah and me.  Continue reading “That Felt Like a Mother’s Love”

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A Place That Will Always Belong To Her

The Doig family visits their daughter’s foster family in Thailand — a reunion that shows just how meaningful and enduring the foster experience can be.

Elizabeth Doig with her foster mom and sister.

Being back in Thailand — once again riding in a van with two HSF social workers to our daughter’s foster home — was surreal. Six and a half years ago, we took this same trip in a similar van, after just having met our daughter for the first time. I still have vivid memories of that day, working our way through Bangkok traffic with our grieving daughter sitting on my husband’s lap.  I was nervous, uncertain what to expect, and yet eager to glean any information I could from our daughter’s foster family about her personality and the place she had lived the first year and a half of her life.  That first visit, when we met Elizabeth’s foster family for the first time, we watched as our daughter relaxed and became at ease as she navigated her familiar environment. She blossomed and came to life that first visit, and it was our first glimpse into her true personality and an introduction to what her life had been like before we met her. Continue reading “A Place That Will Always Belong To Her”

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140 Children, Forever Loved From Korea

Together, Mrs. Yang and Mrs. Kim have fostered over 140 children in Korea. Last month, they visited Holt families in Oregon — an experience they, and the adoptees and adoptive families they met, will never forget.

Mrs. Yang sat in a room at Holt’s international headquarters in Oregon — sobbing.

She clutched the glossy photobook to her chest then set it down to cover her face with her hands. The photobook was sent to her by a Holt family, and full of pictures and descriptions about how their son was doing. Her shoulders rose and fell with emotion and a Holt Korea social worker and translator, who was helping me with the interview, put an arm around her. “Separation is not easy,” she said to me. Continue reading “140 Children, Forever Loved From Korea”