Hi all. Vi here. Merry Christmas from our family of 11!!! Last night, we had the first reunion of ALL 5 foster kids + 1 sibling (Audrie Siew 's ex foster dg who has also stayed over before), except for the 2 babies we previously fostered. It was a riot! But a delight to catch up and to pray a blessing over them at Christmas. Having lived 5 decades; believed in Jesus for 4 of those decades; been a psychologist for 3 decades, a parent for 2 & a foster parent for 1...... I am still awestruck & moved by the profundity of the Christmas Story & Message. It answers all the psychological, existential, relational questions I have had in my life, not just from my own childhood search for truth & meaning, but as a mental health professional and parent. - As a psychologist, I know that there is something inside of us that yearns for absolute goodness/perfection as well as deep connection (unconditional love), but in my experience, we are not inherently good, despite humanist...

Inspirational sharing by Robin Lim & Linda Foo who have fostered a total of 20 kids (from 5 days old to 14 years), caring for them for periods ranging from a month to 13 years!!!! In 2003, their then-16 yo son brought home a friend who had family problems and needed a place to stay. Instead of turning their son's friend away, the couple stepped out in faith and in obedience to God, and allowed him to stayed with them for several months. After that God led them to help a church friend who was going through marital and financial problems to care for 2 young children for 6 months. This served as preparation and started them on their journey to fostering. They felt God lead them to open up their home to children who needed a place to stay temporarily, and signed up with MSF. Robin stressed that, in the ministry of fostering, the "heart"-ware was most important aspect. He highlighted the following 7 attributes we should work towards: 1) Have largeness of heart and a reser...

  Session on "The Voice of the Local Church in the WWO (World without Orphans) Movement" in the Global Forum for the WWO: 1) Vivienne Ng sharing about what churches & HFG-SG are doing in SG to provide foster families to kids who needs family care. 2) Shelton Taguma & Remmy Hamapande sharing about the work of Forgotten Voices in Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe, where a total of 5126 orphans have been impacted through the provision of family-based care via 59 partners. 3) Jodi Jackson-Tucker from Christian Alliance for Orphans (CAFO) sharing about the reach of Orphan Sunday into 101 countries, as a mean to promote awareness of the orphan crisis and to galvanize the churches to action.

  It’s a fan girl moment with Elli Oswald from Faith To Action Initiative at the Global Forum for World Without Orphans! We have been so blessed by their high quality, research based and sensitive materials to educate the Christian community on the need to support families instead in perpetuating orphanage care for vulnerable children in mission fields! We use their materials for churches and Christians in Singapore who approach us on how to best help vulnerable children in mission fields! Do you know that UNICEF research shows that 70-90% of kids in orphanages have at least one living family member? Outcomes for kids in family based care such as foster care and kinship care are better too! You can find out more in Faith To Action's link! https://www.faithtoaction.org/start-here/ If you are a church or Christian supporter looking to transition from orphanage to family based care in the mission field, they even developed a guidance manual for this! https://www.faithtoaction.org...

HFG-SG folks were at The Justice Conference Asia, held for the 1st time in SG, & org by Daniel Chua's church & others. Joy, Vi, Mercy, Lydia, Amy etc, were involved in diff ways - speaking, supporting, attending, organizing etc!! And professionals working with vulnerable children & Epworth Fostering Agency were there too!!! Sobering bible verses cited by keynote speaker Rev Eugene Cho, founder of One Day's Wages, remind us again of what is truly important to God... “I can’t stand your religious meetings. I’m fed up with your conferences and conventions. I want nothing to do with your religion projects, your pretentious slogans and goals. I’m sick of your fund-raising schemes, your public relations and image making. I’ve had all I can take of your noisy ego-music. When was the last time you sang to me ? Do you know what I want? I want justice—oceans of it. I want fairness—rivers of it. That’s what I want. That’s all I want." Amos 5:21-24 (MSG) Ken Wytsma unders...

  PTL!! The church in Singapore is standing behind fostering.. wonderful prayer of dedication for those of us involved in helping single moms, the unborn, orphans, children who need out of home care, kids with disability etc. Thanks to all who helped out - Li Ping + Joy for their heartfelt sharing; and for Hwee Ling, Doris, Lee Hwa, Mark/Sue, Chang Loong/Ai Cheng, Vi, Chin Meng/Phay Ling who took shifts manning the booth. Many people signed up to find out more! And we saw Wendy, Raymond/Miriam, Roland/Michelle etc around too!! Lemme know if we miss anyone out? Fabulous showing and wonderful support. Thanks to the organisers of Life Fest!! And our booth partners, Salvation Army !! God bless u all and God bless the children!!!

HFG-SG at the charity premiere of "Unplanned". V moving & enlightening. We wanna play our role to support moms/dads with unplanned preg, by befriending or fostering. And look!!! We finally hv our own banner, kindly made & sponsored by Hwee Ling!! (NB. HFG is NOT a charity so we don't receive any proceeds. We are just a network of foster parents. Pl pray and join us!)

HFG foster parents, Mark Lim and Sue Lim held a special training session for HFG foster parents last Saturday in Agape Baptist Church . Mark and Sue are trainers for special needs and have a heart for children with special needs. It was such a blessing! Joyce Too Yip and her husband, Teh Hsin Too are foster parents who attended and were greatly blessed. You can read Joyce's account below: <We can see her pain now!> My husband and I have been struggling with parenting one of our foster child who was diagnosed with Global Development Delay. Although she is 13, she is unable to do basic things confidently such as daily brushing of her teeth, getting the correct change when buying food, reading time and distinguishing between AM and PM. She also has trouble managing her emotions. Her occasional outbursts which involve crying, screaming and shouting on top of her lungs at home, in school or at public places has demoralised her and affected her ability to make friends. Fostering...

Joint HFG Intro tea with The Salvation Army Singapore on 21 Sept 2019. The following is a summary of their sharing. Kian Seng and Carol’s hearts were moved a few times until they had no doubt fostering is God’s will for them. Carol is a homemaker and Kian Seng works as a teacher. Kian Seng’s first encounter with a foster child was with a 17 year old student in their school. They later met a sister from China and were touched and encouraged that she was fostering children in Singapore. It struck them that she was a foreigner but still willing to take care of children in need outside of their country. But when a foster parent from church asked them if they were interested to foster and at that time the answer was still a clear cut NO as they had 3 young children! God had other plans for them! A 6 year old boy, Terry, came to church with his grandmother. He had behaviour issues and would roll on the floor during church services! Terry's mother had abandoned him. At K2, he is unable t...

Ever wondered how foster parents make sense of their foster children reunifying? Here is another little snippet by our HFG foster parent, Audrie Siew. (From HFG FB post on 8 Sept 2019) EVERYDAY FOSTERING - Paper Hearts We were driving. My foster child, "Ellie" (not her real name) suddenly passed me this paper heart. I asked her why... And she said, "Because I love you." I was touched. I know she did it because she was grateful... I was trying to help her with sthg in school on my phone. She was very upset due to some vicious "playground politics" (Parents, pl teach children to be kind and inclusive!! It does hurt kids!) Ellie is in the process of reunifying now and she is starting to stay with her parents more. I rejoice that she can finally go home to her parents that she loves so much. She stays with my family for 5 days a week now and we still have much to do to help her be successful in her reunification. We process with her on what habits she has lear...

This morning, hundreds of children did not wake up in their own beds within a family setting in Singapore. There are currently 1166 children in care, of which 535 are in foster homes. The remaining 631 are still in residential care. (Statistics from MSF website as of December 2018.) Choa-Tan Ai Cheng and Joyce Too Yip were invited by Ai Lin Lim to speak to her students from the Raffles Community Leadership and Citizenry Program in August. Ai Cheng shared about the work and need of child protection and foster care in Singapore. She explained how having a primary care giver for every child in a home setting is fundamental to the healthy growth of every child. Joyce shared examples how Dora (not her real name) a very sick child and assumed to be developmentally affected, has grown to the bubbly and cheerful preschooler she is today. She also highlighted how her special needs foster child could learn to identify and differentiate her own emotions and feel safe in a home environment. The...

       Joint fostering tea session with  Epworth Community Services Epworth Foster Care in July 2019. Angeline Wee shared her 1.5 year journey as a foster parent. It started with a seed planted > 10 years ago. when her sister-in-law provided temporary care for babies under Sanctuary House and she found herself going over to coo over the babies. Fast forward years later, when her son was in P6, Angeline started to look for different areas of ministry. She considered mission trips, particularly those involving rescuing women and kids from sex trafficking. She heard of someone else fostering at that point. Curious, she enquired more about fostering and after an exchange of text messages, Angeline found herself scrolling through the fostering section of the Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) website. Mooting the idea to her husband, she was taken by complete surprise when he readily agreed without hesitation! And so, in a matter of 6 mths, they wen...