Introducing The Walton County+ Foster Care Clothing Closet.

 ( photo for illustration and goal to set up a similar operation)

We are undertaking a new venture to lead toward our eventual full service foster care and adoption village. Officially launching in January 2026, we will be stocking BRAND NEW items initially for new foster placements, emergency situations, and temporary placements into care.

We are focusing on the First 61 hours of needs primarily. If a child is removed from their home, they may spend hours or days waiting for a temporary placement. Recently, an 11 year old was placed in Loganville who had been wearing the same clothes for 3 days. The Fostering mom reached out asking for clothing because the girl had to put on her 3 day worn dirty clothing after her shower the night before. The nearest clothing bank for foster children was 40 minutes away and not open for an additional 4 days. We've also been asked to start stocking mattresses to prevent children from being removed from homes for lack of proper sleeping arrangements and also for temporary placements. These issues are difficult and compounded by the fact that each region in GA is left to figure out care for its own foster services without a centralized support system or standards of care.

Please Visit our Walmart Good-Spark Registry or our Amazon Charitable Registry to help us meet these needs. (see recommendations at the bottom for our registry fulfillment) 

We will selectively offer pre-owned clothing in good condition as space allows especially for the younger children.
We have received about $1000 in various donated clothing. Our initial stock needs of 3 sets of a 3-day supply of basic clothing & toiletry needs for ages 8+ has not been met. Once the initial needs are close to being met, we can begin services to the foster community, utilizing operational funds to meet resource gaps when a specific needed item is out of stock on a case by case basis. We ask for local churches to partner with us to present our needs to their small groups and congregations to keep our shelves stocked. 

Our BIG needs as of today:

• A small storage/disbursement location in Walton County (Loganville preferred) where social workers and house-parents can bring the children to pick out appropriate sized items. We would need almost 24hr access due to many overnight emergency placements. 
• Brand New packages of underwear, t-shirts, bras/etc, socks, etc for boys and girls age 8-17
• Brand New Sweat pants and shirts (preferably matched sets) for ages 8-17
• Brand New Socks in all youth sizes plus some adult sizes since many youth are 6ft or taller these days.
• Brand New Twin or Full size mattresses, sheets, mattress protectors, pillow cases.
• Feminine Hygiene supplies, Bar Soap, Toothbrushes/ paste, hair combs & brushes, small toiletry pouches, fingernail clippers
• medium to large backpacks

Secondary needs:

• A 7x14 or similar enclosed cargo trailer to transport the mattresses and possibly use as a mobile foster closet.
• Blue Jean pants and appropriate skirts or dresses for youth
• Cold weather clothing for youth
• School Supplies - if they were not allowed to return home for clothes, they likely do not have any school supplies either. 
• Stuffed animals, blankets, hoodies for teens, fidget spinners, card games
• CASH donations (or gift cards) so that we can accompany the caregiver and children to Walmart for basic shoes when needed or other un-met needs.

We ask for all local churches and charities to partner with us for this launch. To be ready for the expected unexpected sizes of children and sibling groups, we need to stock 3-5 sealed packages of each size undergarment pack, 3-5 pkgs of socks in each shoe size, plus 3 sizes of every pair of sweats in either neutral colors or traditional gender preferred colors (ie someone donates 3 pink or pastel sets, we would likely want to also have 3 sets of a traditional boy color in case it matters to the child, but if someone donates 3 grey or other gender neutral color then that level of stock should suffice. It would be great to give every child their favorite color but that is not feasible at this starting stage) 

Our Budget for this is coming in at around $4500 for supplies alone. We are on the waiting list for an Executive office in Loganville to use as a literal "closet" and of course hope for a larger facility as soon as funds allow! 

 It would be a huge blessing to find a Mattress provider who would donate NEW mattresses. We will try to find free mattresses from pet/mold/smoke free homes off Marketplace. We'd welcome help from others to search for those give-aways once we have a location to store them. For temporary placements, we'll just loan them out as we did recently with one 3month placement. 

This is the launch of a new program. We hope that ALL of the above items will be granted to us for this purpose by one or more of the manufacturers. We are also partnering with several other Clothing Closets outside of Walton County to supply them with any over flow especially if they take the used clothing which we can source more easily but have little space to store. 

There are thousands of foster children in GA and only about half of them have a place to be cared for safely! We need more foster families. If you are interested in fostering, please let us know and we can connect you with an organization who is licensed by GA to assist you! Thank you.

Registry Recommendations:

The registry has numerous categories and options for ordering for the children and teens. Since we are starting from used clothing donations, we'd like to recommend the following considerations.

The primary goal for our launch is to acquire the basics in the most common sizes for ages 8-17. We are focusing on providing just the initial clothing to help youth transition into care. If we can provide 3 days of clothing to begin with, the child's caretakers should be able to source the more substantial supplies from the support agencies in the larger cites. We'll work our way up to being able to meet more needs as time and donations allow. 
Each child/teen will receive:

•  Ample socks and underwear for 3 days
• 1 pair of sweats (cozy, works as PJs or daily attire)
• 1 comb or hair brush, 1 toothbrush, toothpaste, bar soap/travel soap dish, 2 in 1 shampoo/conditioner, deodorant
• 1 bath towel and washcloth
• 1 backpack or duffle bag
• 1 gospel book or activity to share Jesus if the child wants one
• girls may receive appropriate female specific products/garments
• optional items may be phone chargers, winter attire, a stuffed animal or fidget toy, first aid supplies, special needs items, personal grooming items (nail or skin care), a hat, toy(s). 

Option 1: Pick a clothing item such as underwear, order 1 package in as many sizes as your budget allows for. 
Option 2: Pick an age group, order 1 complete set of clothing i.e. package of socks, package of undergarments, sweatpants, sweatshirt, backpack, and toiletry basics for a boy or girl.
Option 3: Take note of already purchased numbers of registry items. If you see an item showing 0 ordered which seems important for the needs, purchase a few to help get us started. 

Our Walmart Spark Good registry was made considering as many discounted items as would meet the needs in order to stretch donor's budgets to the fullest. Some items may have been placed on the Amazon or Walmart registries when a sale or clearance price was listed and may not reflect the more cost effective selections when you see them (hoodies especially). If something seems high about a price, feel free to select a similar option from the registry and let us know so we can check that item. Feminine hygiene items were selected for 100% organic cotton content and related health benefits. Girls who desire the typical brands or have other female related needs will be given a Walmart gift card to pick out what is needed. Currently we only have Crocs & very inexpensive shoes on the registries as youth are very specific in type and need variation or in fact it may simply be feeling a certain way about their wardrobe among the other losses, so gifting them brand name attire might be needed for a select few. If any come with inadequate footwear, they will also receive a gift card for Walmart (if we have one) & be given some Crocs or gently used donated shoes to get them there safely. 

Eventually, the clothing closet supplies will be made available to first responders in the area for rescued children as well as emergency displacement situations like house fire evacuee children. We already have some gently used clothing donations we'll also hold for any adults/children in an emergency where first responders need a set of garments before taking them to a temporary shelter.

I, Gabriel, am not new to being affiliated with foster care transitions but I am new to being directly involved with meeting the needs myself. As these initial programs are launched, I'll use my many years of knowledge in the flawed foster care system of another state to meet these basic human needs while educating myself in order to strategically hire the best full time specialists to expand the program into a full service foster and adoption village. Please partner with me as I delve into a heart wrenching and unfathomable area of social need. In the simple task of opening a clothing service for youth, I've already encountered the fact that this is impossible without God and without the help of the community. I wouldn't want it any other way!