Our family needs help.

 My older sister, my only sibling, Kristy Thomas, of Lebanon, passed away unexpectedly in September of last year—just a few weeks after her 47th birthday. She died due to complications of cancer.
She left behind her two young sons, Kobe and Knox. They are 10 and 11.

Since her passing, Travis and I have had the honor of becoming the boys guardians.
They have moved in with us, and just like that, our family of 4 became a family of 6.
 For the past 10 months, the boys have been sleeping in makeshift spaces we created while we’ve worked behind the scenes to build onto our house. Our house isn’t big enough to
fit our new larger family.

-And so that the boys can finally have something they’ve never had before: bedrooms of their own! A space that is theirs.

 Since construction began, they’ve been so excited!—talking about their future rooms, mentally decorating, and dreaming big-out loud. Knox, 10, has asked repeatedly if he could go ahead and move into his room. 
(It’s literally just framework.)

 They both have birthdays coming up, one in late August and the other in mid September. When we asked what they wanted this year. Both boys gave the same answer:
“We just want our rooms to be finished.”
That’s their birthday wish. Nothing more.
 This year they just want their own spaces so they can officially begin this new chapter of their lives and not be unsettled anymore.

And we want nothing more than to make that happen. Last year Kristy, their mom, was in the hospital on Kobe’s birthday, and then she passed away a few days before Knox’s, on hospice in our home.
 Her service was the day after
his 10th birthday. It was all a nightmare.
No child should have to deal with that, especially on or around their birthday.
 This year we would love to make their wishes come true! Birthdays are supposed to be
full of HAPPY- magic and dreams coming true when you are little. They deserve this, especially after everything that’s happened.

We know this a big dream to achieve, but it’s not impossible.

 Along side all of this, we’ve also asked my mom to move in with us. Kristy and the boys had been living with her since our dad passed
away in 2017 and they were helping take
care of one another. My mother is disabled
and a senior citizen. After losing Kristy, it became clear that the best thing for all of us was to be together—under one roof,
supporting and caring for each other as we continue to grieve and heal.

To make all this possible, we began building an addition. We’ve cut corners, downsized the plans, and carefully budgeted—but early on we hit a major obstacle: Because of the flood zone we live in, we are required to build the addition seven feet off the ground.
That unexpected issue raised the costs dramatically and made the build far more complex. Because my mom can’t do the stairs, we’re giving her our bedroom on the ground floor, and Travis and I will be moving upstairs with the boys once everything is complete. We’re completely reworking our lives and our space to make this work—for all of us.

 Once everyone is here, we’ll be a family of seven: our two teenage daughters, the boys, my mom, and us.

 Our contractor has been amazing—trying to work within building codes and connect the addition to the existing home like a giant puzzle up in the air. All while trying to help us keep the cost down the best he can. It’s been a challenge at every turn, but we have kept pushing forward.

In the meantime, we’re juggling two households, ours, and the one my mom is still in—until we can bring her here permanently. Keeping up two households, plus 4 kids, plus building on- isn’t for the faint of heart. It’s overwhelming, emotionally exhausting, and financially draining.

❤️Now for some good news: The entire framework is complete. The structure is up, and we’re ready for the next phase. We’ve had plumbers and electricians here all week.

❤️ The bad news: We’re running out of funds—and we simply won’t be able to finish this addition without help.

 We’re pouring everything we have into this— all of us. Kristy’s life insurance, our personal savings, loans, my mom’s savings, even the kids have been helping. They’ve been holding lemonade stands trying to help us raise money. Travis is working extra hours. We’re selling everything we can. -We are doing everything in our power to make it work out, but the costs and constant curveballs have stretched us to the limits.

Before she passed away, my sister made me promise that we would we raise the boys and love them like they were ours- that parts easy. Also that we use her life insurance to give them bedrooms of their own. A safe place for them to grow up, a place for a fresh start, a place where they could just be kids. And we’re trying our absolute best to keep that promise.- but that part is proving to be much harder than we imagined.

These are the last promises I made to her and they are all I think about.

We’re trying so hard to make her proud, and fulfill these promises.

After a lot of prayers and tears, it’s became clear to us that we need to set our egos aside and to humbly, sincerely, and urgently ask for help. We’ve always heard it takes a village to raise children, we desperately need our village to help us.

 Donating or even just sharing this- helps us keep those last promises, it helps us give the boys their birthday dream, and it helps us have a place where we can bring my momma- so she’s here with us. Finishing this would finally get us finally get to a point where we can just breath again and finally start to move forward instead of being stuck in this phase of emotional and financial chaos.

We just need help, however we can get it. Thank you for reading all of this! And thank you in advance if you are able to help us or simply just share this post.

 Ways to help: A link to my public shareable post: https://www.facebook.com/share/1AZRMcVAEt/?mibextid=wwXIfr


To those of you that have donated already or shared our post- thank you from the bottom of our hearts! It means the world to us!

Please keep sharing our story and helping us keep the word out.

 - Katie Thomas and Travis Taylor