The daily

demands of caring for fragile, severely ill children can

take a tremendous toll on the care giving parents and

family members.

Hope House

is a home-based care program that provides time out for

the families of these special children.

year, the dream of building a respite care center for

dozens of children afflicted with life threatening

conditions who live in Fayette and 11 neighboring

counties will become a reality.

Mary Lou

Marshall, operations manager for Hope House, estimated

the cost of building the center, which will be next to

Southwest Christian Hospice in Union City, to be about

$1.2 million. "Presently, there is no respite care

here for children," Marshall said. There is one room

allocated for this purpose at the hospice, but the

current method of service is for staff members and

volunteers to stay with the child in his home.

Plans call

for an eight-bedroom wing complete with a family lounge,

two parent's efficiency rooms, game room, computer and

music room, library, multisensory room, hydrotherapy

pool, spa bath and showers, gardens, outdoor play area

and chapel. Staffing will include a care manager and

nursing staff, pediatric nurses, nursing assistants, a

social worker, physiotherapist, a chaplain and support

staff.

Five years

ago, Myrna Bond, director of nursing at Southwest

Christian Hospice, attended an international conference

on children's hospice care in Washington, D.C. She

returned home with a new sense of joy and dedication to

the goal of caring for children with life threatening

conditions.

"As I

listened to parents report disturbed sleep, fatigue and

burnout, I realized how much they needed our supportive

care," she said. "Jesus let us know how

important children are to Him when He said, `Suffer the

little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for

of such is the Kingdom of Heaven' (Mark 10:14).

"Many

of these children have 24-hour care demands and can never

be left alone," Bond added. "I started thinking

how wonderful it would be if we would begin providing

inpatient respite care for these children and these

parents.

"The

parents could stay and assist with care until they felt

comfortable leaving them with us," she said.

"The children and the parents could benefit from

assistance with physical care, as well as the spiritual

encouragement we provide," she added.

Respite

care could be a few days, or as long as two weeks on any

one visit, she said.

This is the

goal of Hope House, and it will be met through donations

from churches, corporate sponsors and individuals.

Volunteers

provide an enormous amount of support for Hope House,

from caring for the children to offering little extras,

such as Easter baskets.

When

Jennifer Cole of Tyrone signed on and trained as a

volunteer, she was asked by Marshall to coordinate the

holiday basket project. She was linked up with Buddy and

Janice Duncan of Wildwood flowers and gifts in

Fayetteville and the result was 17 pastel-ribboned

baskets customized for each child.

The process

of shopping for the toys and books for the baskets and

the assembly took some interesting twists and turns.

"The week I met with Janice, I received a check for

$300 from a friend named Renee Namaste of Costa Mesa,

Calif.," Cole said. "She said she was leaving

her legacy now before she dies." Although Cole

discovered her old friend was not ill, she wanted to do

something special. She decided to use the found cash for

unique and personal gifts to fill the baskets.

In the

meantime, Duncan was hit with the news that she must

undergo surgery for breast cancer. She and her husband

assembled all the baskets prior to her hospital stay.

"It was very important to me to get it done,"

Duncan said, "and we really enjoyed doing it."

Duncan said

Thursday that she's "doing great" and is back

at work. The baskets will be delivered to the Hope House

children before Easter weekend.

For

information about Hope House and its volunteer program,

phone 770-969-8354.