This month was very special for me (Anna). I got to celebrate Mother’s day with the girls from San Jose Children’s Home. I was here last year as well, but my relationship with the girls was different. I was just getting to know them and trying to gain their trust.

I know that for all of them this day can be very hard because they are not able to be with their biological mothers.

I cannot imagine what that would be like.

My mom lives in Michigan, but even though she is so far away I am able to stay connected to her in so many ways like Skype that keeps our relationship strong.

These girls don’t have that privilege. Some of them don’t know where their moms are and haven’t seen them in years. Some only see them during the weekends and some are scared of their moms or are not able to talk to them because they are mentally ill.

Andrew and I decided to spend mother’s day with them. We wanted to do something that would help them to not think too much about what they were missing.

I am not their biological mother and I am not able to supply that need, but something that the Conrad family can do is to provide an example of what it is like to be loved and accepted by your family. So we took them out for dinner.

Going to restaurants is one of the ways that Andrew’s parents use to show us how much they love us. They usually let us pick where we want to go and we can get what ever we want in the menu. So we did the same for the girls.

We took them to a restaurant that we thought they would like the food from and each one got their own menu. They picked what ever they wanted. They looked so excited and happy. We talked about our day and I loved seeing Andrew and I surrounded by children.

The best part of the day was on our way to take them home, when Jimena sang a song to me.

What was so special about this song was that it was the same song that I used to sing to my mom for mother’s day. I felt so honored to be the one that she picked to sing that song to.

That made me feel like God has truly used me to impact her life, that she doesn’t see me as just a Back2Back staff member that comes to visit but some one to look up to, just the same way that I see my mom.

They also made a letter for me that is now on my fridge reminding me why God sent me here, to love on this girls like a mom should.

It has been a privilege to have God use us to serve these girls and the blessings that they give back are more than I could have ever imagined God would ever give us.