We’re doing something new here at Grown in My Heart…every month we’ll be featuring one of our writers (and eventually one of our amazing readers). Our first writer is Carrie from Signs of Hope, an incredible wife and mother to about one hundred foster children in China. I had the joy...

I often forget we work at an orphanage. After all, we call it a foster home.  And, if you go there during the daytime hours, the place is buzzing with so much activity that one has no time to think about the fact that all of the children are orphans.  Compared to most orphanages, the place is paradise!...

I have a friend who is a doula.  She coaches moms and dads through the birthing process, reminding them that they have the strength within to finish the journey. It struck me the other day, as I sat with a new mom and dad as they met their adoptive daughter for the first time, that I’m a doula of...

Two steps and a knock from my front door, and I’m in an orphanage.  We don’t call it an orphanage, but a rose by any other name is still a rose.  No matter what we call it, Mommy and Daddy don’t come home at night. She’s eight.  Sometime in February 2009, she lost everything. ...

I remember the prayers I used to say, staring out the window at the heat waves rising from the pavement.  The summer dirt opened up, parched and begging for rain.  I peered down deep and wondered if a penny dropped in the cracks would fall out in China.  I heard the grown-ups talking about failing...

She’s not even 21 days old. She’s one of the most beautiful babies I’ve ever seen. Fine porcelain features, flawless skin, and full lips. She’s tiny, and her little fingers look so fragile that I’m almost afraid to touch her. When I sit beside her crib watching her sleep,...

Twice this week I had the opportunity to be in the room when an adoptive family met their new child for the first time.  It’s a beautiful moment from the perspective of the new mom and dad.  But if you watch through the eyes of the foster mother, it’s heart-wrenching.  She carefully answered...

This wasn’t the life we had planned. When Jacob and I got married in August 2005, we had our own little version of an American dream to chase, and it didn’t involve living in a small Chinese village. I know it sounds crazy when we tell people that we quit perfectly good jobs in the USA, gave away...