Fostering Sweet Dreams, a nonprofit formed in 2016, was chosen as the philanthropy project for Oklahoma Christian University’s 2023 Spring Sing production.
Kristy Payne, founder of Fostering Sweet Dreams (FSD), said their mission is to “provide essential resources to Oklahoma’s most vulnerable children.”
Though FSD began seven years ago, Payne’s journey to aid foster children has been ongoing for the past 17 years when she and her husband decided to become foster parents. Over three months of classes, they met a variety of kinship families and started hearing stories about the need FSD aims to address today.
“If you decide to become a foster parent, you start getting a reimbursement check each month after you have the child in your home for 30 days,” Payne said. “That’s wonderful, but there is no reimbursement to that family whatsoever until they complete the whole process. And that can be anywhere from six months to a year.”
This, Payne said, often leads to difficult situations.
“The kinship families say yes because they love the children. However, a lot of them find financial strain in providing the items they need to right off the bat,” Payne said. “Many times, these children are large sibling sets anywhere from six or more children. As you can imagine, buying six beds is a lot, even one bed for some people. At some point when we were hearing this, we felt like that shouldn’t be a roadblock for family getting to stay with family.”
Junior Asiah Powers, the student director of Spring Sing’s philanthropy, said they met her criteria perfectly.
“I wanted this year’s theme of imagination and childhood to be tied into whatever group we chose. But I also wanted to do something new, find a nonprofit we’ve not partnered with before,” Powers said. “So, I went on the internet, searched nonprofits supporting children and found them and learned about them and their mission. All things considered, this is a perfect group.”
When Payne decided to found FSD in 2016, it seemed like everyone chipped in, from their foster attorney providing free paperwork to a business friend lending a building for six months. After realizing they had impacted 24 children in their first month, Payne cried.
“My husband’s like, ‘what’s wrong?’ and I said ‘we impacted 24 kids this month,’” Payne said. “He said ‘And?’ Well, we could never have fostered 24 children in a month.”
Since then, they have grown to impact approximately 90 children a month, have affected 47 of Oklahoma’s 77 counties and expanded the items they offer from beds, which remain their priority, to include strollers, car seats, high chairs and more.
Still, Payne said there is more work to be done.
“The worst stories we hear is when the foster child has to sleep in the biological child’s bed and the biological child was kicked out because, to put [a foster child] in the home, a lot of counties are strict on them having their own bed,” Payne said. “So, the stories are endless. The need is huge.”
When asked what they would do if funds were not an issue, Payne said they would “remain smart with the funds allocated to us and diligent about doing the right thing. But it would be nice to not have to sift through these applications deciphering who needs what worse.”
Spring Sing’s philanthropy (i.e. the silent auction, fundraising donations from local businesses, the sheet drive and more) aims to help this organization, but anyone wishing to do so in a more direct manner is encouraged to visit their website, fosteringsweetdreams.com, or email them at fosteringsweetdreams@gmail.com to learn more about how to support them financially or donate acceptable items no longer needed.
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