Stewart Community Home, Columbus, GA Videos

A Day of Fun and Relaxation! 🌞🏊‍♂️ Our longtime SCH board member, Denise Fortson, graciously invited our residents to spend a lovely Friday afternoon at her place. Everyone had a blast swimming in the pool and later enjoyed visiting her horses at the barn. It was such a nice day filled with joy and relaxation! 🐴💦 We’re so grateful for the kindness and generosity of our community. Thank you, Denise, for making this day so special for our residents!

This week, we visited the National Infantry Museum, thanks to our new Executive Director, Jim Accordino. Jim, a volunteer and docent at the museum for five years, arranged for a group of our residents to enjoy a personal tour led by him. This unique experience combined two of Jim's passions and allowed our residents to see him in action. One of our new veteran residents, who had never visited the museum before, joined us. During the tour, he heard his unit number from his time in Kuwait mentioned in one of the videos, which was especially meaningful for him. It's wonderful to learn more about our residents and share these meaningful experiences with them.

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On Thursday of this past week, A police officer called me in desperation. His shift was almost up, and he had been dealing with a young homeless couple all day. She is 18 years old and 8 months pregnant. She is mentally challenged. He is 21 years old, has one eye and is autistic. The police officer said he had been called because they were loitering in a grocery store parking lot. Everyone knew they were homeless because they had a suitcase and several backpacks, plus they were very dirty. As the story goes, an elderly man drove up to the couple about the same time as the police officer. He said he knew who the couple was, and he knew their family, but their family was “of no account” and threw the girl out when they found out she was pregnant. The old man gave the couple $40 and the police officer told them to walk across to a local fast-food restaurant—they would be allowed to stay there while the officer tried to get them some help. The police officer states that he has called everyone he knows—shelters, churches, homeless resources—and he has gotten ringing phones with no answers, voice mails, or definite “no room” replies. When he called the Stewart Home the first time, I explained to him that we are not an emergency shelter, and we cannot accept this little family as we cannot house families with children. When he called the second time, he was begging me. He said, “I know that these people are not your normal residents, but you’ve helped me before. Is there anything you can do?” I drove and met this officer at the fast-food restaurant. When I got there, the young couple was sitting in the back seat of a pickup truck with an old man in the driver’s seat. The officer explained that this is the same man who gave them money for food earlier in the day. The man had come back to the restaurant this evening to make sure “the kids” were okay. I introduced myself and learned that the young couple had gotten in touch with

We had such a special treat at our party this year. One of our residents has a wonderful talent of singing and playing his guitar (which he has done in the evenings at the home frequently), so he played and sang Christmas music this year after Kara read the real story of Christmas. The staff members all pitched in to bring food and treats for the party, and we celebrated it all like one very big family. It was absolutely delightful.

Amazing Grace