when I was a little girl I had two big
goals in life one was I wanted to be a
mom and the other one was I wanted to
make a difference so when I was 19 I
graduated as a nurse a registered nurse
I did not have a husband I did not know
what was up with that at the ripe age
ripe old age of 21 however I did get
married at 22 I had my first baby at 23
I had my second baby and that’s where my
life started to change because that
second baby was a daughter born with
really significant disabilities at 24 I
had my third child and I thought my
heart and my hands were probably pretty
full what I didn’t know is it not even
close
so my husband about a year later so that
baby is a year old the other one was too
and my oldest was only three years old
my husband was watching television and
he said to me come Holly you’ve got to
come in and see this and it was a 2020
show by Barbara Walters talking about
Romanian orphanages and I watched that
show and I saw kids tied to beds
naked kids with disabilities who were
treated like animals worse than animals
but I also saw some American families
who had gone to Romania and adopted
they’d figured out how to navigate this
international adoption process and I was
on fire I knew this was our path and I
turned to my husband and I said I have
to go and he just looked at me and he
said I know and a few weeks later I was
across the ocean and I was in Romania I
took a home study I took immigration
clearance I took a lot of hope and a lot
of fear it was the scariest thing I’ve
ever done I was 26 and it was really
frightening but eight and a half weeks
later I was able to cross the ocean
again and this time I came back with two
little girls they joined our family and
I knew that it mattered
them that they had a family and in case
you’re thinking it was easy it was not I
had 5 kids
4 and under ok my oldest was barely
potty-trained the three-year-old was
handicapped and I had three one-year-old
two and two of them were disabled so it
was a year that I barely remember but
even though I was thrown in the deep end
I kind of was dog paddling just trying
to survive once my head kind of cleared
and I was able to catch my breath again
I thought gosh I could do that again
and so we did a couple of years later I
found myself in Russia and I was
adopting a little girl and the orphanage
worker shook her hand and said this is a
bad baby
why are you adopting a bad baby there
are good babies here why don’t you get a
good baby do you know why they called
her a bad baby she was missing some
fingers and toes that’s it that was the
label she got is that she was a bad baby
well I knew that our family even though
we’re not perfect that we could make a
difference to that child she grew up she
graduated from high school with great
grades she manages a retail store right
[Applause]
it made a difference to crystianna that
she was able to join a family a few
years after that we had an opportunity
to adopt a newborn the problem was this
newborn was dying her birth mother was
so addicted to meth that she was dying
inside
and when she was born the doctor said to
us she has maybe a 5% chance of survival
and what I learned later is that’s code
for she is not gonna make it but we’re
not going to tell you that yet so I
watched her lay in her hospital bed and
go through withdrawal suffer to try and
breathe and she did come home seven
weeks later she was back in our home and
18 years later she’s a high school
graduate she was played on her varsity
basketball team she has a photographer
and earlier this summer she crossed the
ocean with me to go volunteer in an
orphanage she’s pretty awesome right
[Applause]
well I apparently am really good at
saying yes and so we kept going and we
have a family of 25 children
they range in age from 3 to 31 there’s
all kinds of abilities and disabilities
all kinds of colors they ended up coming
from 8 different countries and we we
love it but I don’t want you to think
that it was easy so at our peak we had
20 at home at one time there were ages 1
to 17 I had 4 in diapers I had 3 in
wheelchairs right and and people ask me
all the time did you plan a family like
this and I’m like heck no who plans this
so so so you can imagine that I have
been overwhelmed in my life and I’ve
looked for ways to help fix that
overwhelm and you may not have a family
like mine they’re pretty rare right they
do happen but I’m pretty sure that you
felt overwhelming your life before and
I’m going to share with you what I found
to be the best way to help that there’s
two things really one it’s I keep a list
of things that I’m grateful for right I
have traveled to some of the poorest
countries in the world and it does not
take long for me to be really grateful
for flushing toilets and clean water
that comes out of the faucet yeah so the
other thing is service and the ability
to do service for other people outside
of my own family and here’s the most
amazing and beautiful paradox is the
more you serve other people the more
your own burden is lifted you do not
need anything special to go out and
serve you do not need to be a specific
age or have a specific income or have a
certain type of job or a certain type of
skill I’ve met people who were three and
four and five years old who are doing
stuff for their neighbors and I’ve met
95 year olds who are doing things and I
want to introduce you to a friend of
mine his name is Tamara Tamara is a
Syrian refugee he lives in Turkey
he lived in Syria and he was doing work
in Syria during the civil war that
started seven years ago he was on burial
detail in his city and he said to me in
May when I met him that he sometimes
would be
five or six people a day and these are
people that he knew right well he made
some people mad and when his office was
targeted and bombed he figured it was
probably fine time for him to leave as
well so he’s in Turkey he lives on the
border and he spends all day every day
helping other refugees who are in worse
circumstances than he is he drives a
taxi in the evening so that he can help
pay to help other people well when I met
him he had this ring on his finger and
he kept touching it he kept clicking it
and I have to ask right so I said what
is that and he said oh it’s a gratitude
counter and I said really and he said
yeah he said I click it every time
there’s something I’m thankful for so
that I could let Allah know that I am
thankful for the blessings that he’s
given me so I asked him well how many
times a day do you click this any
guesses I was blown away when he said
his average is 1,800 times a day 1,800
times a day he finds something to be
pretty grateful for and I think I’m
lucky if I can find three to five right
that’s tammer I’ve also had the
opportunity to cross the ocean twice
this year and go to Bangladesh
Bangladesh is a poor country in its own
right and it’s next door to Myanmar
there’s been a genocide that’s been
going on and rahega refugees have been
fleeing across to the country that’s
already poor well one of the stories
that I heard while I was there is a
farmer Bangladeshi farmer average wage a
dollar a day cleared trees off of his
land so that people could set up tents
there the refugees and he said when he
was asked why did you do this he said I
have enough and I wanted to be able to
share with people who have nothing there
are also children who are there without
their parents their parents were killed
they’ve been taken and I wondered if
there was an orphanage I wondered if
they were heads of household like they
are another
trees so I asked our guide what happens
to these kids with no parents she said
to me
they’re Rohan NGO welcomed them into
their families and they unfold them into
their families remember they have
nothing and they will still take other
kids into their family and take care of
them that’s such a blessing dr. Martin
Luther King jr. said everybody can be
great because everybody can serve mother
Teresa said if you can’t feed a hundred
feet just one and we all know Mother
Teresa and we know the great work that
she did but not everybody knows free to
build her and they should treatability
lived in Indianapolis during the 1920s
during the Depression we know that many
people in the United States struggled to
survive they lost our jobs they lost
their homes they lost the ability to
feed their families but some people did
have enough and they could share and
Frida was one of those who had enough
and she made it a point to keep jobs
available at her home so that when
people knocked on their her door and
said do you have some food she would say
yes but I need you to do this job first
Frida is my great grandmother and Frida
never started a food pantry
she never campaigned for public policy
changes in fact she didn’t even have to
cross the street to serve people came to
her whom I have loved watching my
children grow up and get a heart for
service my daughter Katie worked an
entry-level job saved her money for
months and then spent half of her annual
wage to go to Africa to work in an
orphanage my son Joshua was able to
teach a little boy across the street how
to swim now Joshua was born with some
pretty significant physical disabilities
he’s been in a wheelchair all his life
we didn’t think he was going to be able
to learn how to swim and he did it was
kind of scary actually because he looks
like he was drowning and he would kind
of flop around in the water and ended up
figuring out a way to kind of swim like
a mermaid or in his case a merman and
there was another little boy who had
disabilities that were similar to
Joshua’s and so somebody came to Joshua
and said could
help teach this little boy how to swim
and he said yes so the little boy it
mattered to him that Joshua would take
the time to teach him how to swim in his
own special style but it also mattered
to Joshua that he had an opportunity to
serve now I know the problems are
overwhelming I know that you can look
out there and say oh my gosh I don’t
know where to start this so much
there’s too much I know that you may be
thinking I don’t think I can cross the
ocean and start an orphanage or what if
I can’t adopt 20 kids it’s really okay
it’s okay you may be thinking again like
I said before that you have to be a
certain age or have a certain skill you
may think well when I have time well let
me tell you a secret
you’re not ever gonna get enough time
and you’re never we’re gonna get so much
money unless you win the lottery right
are you invest wisely that you’re gonna
have so much that you don’t know what to
do with them but the opportunities for
service are everywhere they’re
everywhere and you don’t need to do
something that takes five weeks or five
months or five years you can do
something that takes five minutes and it
makes the difference I want to tell you
about some people that I know who are
making a difference I know of a great
grandmother who lives in Sandy Utah
who’s made 4,000 quilts for babies all
over the world and she’s done it between
her 90th and 95th birthdays I have a
friend Helen who’s a retired
schoolteacher who has crossed the ocean
twice this year to go work in refugee
camps in both Turkey and Bangladesh I
have another friend Sarah she’s busy
with a young family and she saw the news
of what was going on in the world and
she felt like there was something she
could do for the kids and so she created
an organization called balls of Hope and
in two years almost 12,000 little dolls
and bears have gone to children all over
the world I also have a neighbor who
lives in our neighborhood and she serves
us by cutting flowers from her garden
and then taking them to us so that we
can enjoy her beautiful flowers and we
have a neighbor
who helped us a few years ago by letting
my husband cross the street and helping
him build a casket for our daughter I
have a neighbor who knocked on my door a
few years ago and she said I’ve been
thinking about you all day are you okay
and I said no I’m not okay my daughter
Angelia died this morning when we
adopted her she was missing most of her
brain she had seizures she was blind and
we totally loved her she was totally
adorable and we benefited and were
blessed by that neighbor who took five
minutes she didn’t even come in my house
to knock on my door and say are you okay
here’s my question for you we have needs
everywhere big and small is it your time
to cross the ocean or cross the street
thank you [Applause]
goals in life one was I wanted to be a
mom and the other one was I wanted to
make a difference so when I was 19 I
graduated as a nurse a registered nurse
I did not have a husband I did not know
what was up with that at the ripe age
ripe old age of 21 however I did get
married at 22 I had my first baby at 23
I had my second baby and that’s where my
life started to change because that
second baby was a daughter born with
really significant disabilities at 24 I
had my third child and I thought my
heart and my hands were probably pretty
full what I didn’t know is it not even
close
so my husband about a year later so that
baby is a year old the other one was too
and my oldest was only three years old
my husband was watching television and
he said to me come Holly you’ve got to
come in and see this and it was a 2020
show by Barbara Walters talking about
Romanian orphanages and I watched that
show and I saw kids tied to beds
naked kids with disabilities who were
treated like animals worse than animals
but I also saw some American families
who had gone to Romania and adopted
they’d figured out how to navigate this
international adoption process and I was
on fire I knew this was our path and I
turned to my husband and I said I have
to go and he just looked at me and he
said I know and a few weeks later I was
across the ocean and I was in Romania I
took a home study I took immigration
clearance I took a lot of hope and a lot
of fear it was the scariest thing I’ve
ever done I was 26 and it was really
frightening but eight and a half weeks
later I was able to cross the ocean
again and this time I came back with two
little girls they joined our family and
I knew that it mattered
them that they had a family and in case
you’re thinking it was easy it was not I
had 5 kids
4 and under ok my oldest was barely
potty-trained the three-year-old was
handicapped and I had three one-year-old
two and two of them were disabled so it
was a year that I barely remember but
even though I was thrown in the deep end
I kind of was dog paddling just trying
to survive once my head kind of cleared
and I was able to catch my breath again
I thought gosh I could do that again
and so we did a couple of years later I
found myself in Russia and I was
adopting a little girl and the orphanage
worker shook her hand and said this is a
bad baby
why are you adopting a bad baby there
are good babies here why don’t you get a
good baby do you know why they called
her a bad baby she was missing some
fingers and toes that’s it that was the
label she got is that she was a bad baby
well I knew that our family even though
we’re not perfect that we could make a
difference to that child she grew up she
graduated from high school with great
grades she manages a retail store right
[Applause]
it made a difference to crystianna that
she was able to join a family a few
years after that we had an opportunity
to adopt a newborn the problem was this
newborn was dying her birth mother was
so addicted to meth that she was dying
inside
and when she was born the doctor said to
us she has maybe a 5% chance of survival
and what I learned later is that’s code
for she is not gonna make it but we’re
not going to tell you that yet so I
watched her lay in her hospital bed and
go through withdrawal suffer to try and
breathe and she did come home seven
weeks later she was back in our home and
18 years later she’s a high school
graduate she was played on her varsity
basketball team she has a photographer
and earlier this summer she crossed the
ocean with me to go volunteer in an
orphanage she’s pretty awesome right
[Applause]
well I apparently am really good at
saying yes and so we kept going and we
have a family of 25 children
they range in age from 3 to 31 there’s
all kinds of abilities and disabilities
all kinds of colors they ended up coming
from 8 different countries and we we
love it but I don’t want you to think
that it was easy so at our peak we had
20 at home at one time there were ages 1
to 17 I had 4 in diapers I had 3 in
wheelchairs right and and people ask me
all the time did you plan a family like
this and I’m like heck no who plans this
so so so you can imagine that I have
been overwhelmed in my life and I’ve
looked for ways to help fix that
overwhelm and you may not have a family
like mine they’re pretty rare right they
do happen but I’m pretty sure that you
felt overwhelming your life before and
I’m going to share with you what I found
to be the best way to help that there’s
two things really one it’s I keep a list
of things that I’m grateful for right I
have traveled to some of the poorest
countries in the world and it does not
take long for me to be really grateful
for flushing toilets and clean water
that comes out of the faucet yeah so the
other thing is service and the ability
to do service for other people outside
of my own family and here’s the most
amazing and beautiful paradox is the
more you serve other people the more
your own burden is lifted you do not
need anything special to go out and
serve you do not need to be a specific
age or have a specific income or have a
certain type of job or a certain type of
skill I’ve met people who were three and
four and five years old who are doing
stuff for their neighbors and I’ve met
95 year olds who are doing things and I
want to introduce you to a friend of
mine his name is Tamara Tamara is a
Syrian refugee he lives in Turkey
he lived in Syria and he was doing work
in Syria during the civil war that
started seven years ago he was on burial
detail in his city and he said to me in
May when I met him that he sometimes
would be
five or six people a day and these are
people that he knew right well he made
some people mad and when his office was
targeted and bombed he figured it was
probably fine time for him to leave as
well so he’s in Turkey he lives on the
border and he spends all day every day
helping other refugees who are in worse
circumstances than he is he drives a
taxi in the evening so that he can help
pay to help other people well when I met
him he had this ring on his finger and
he kept touching it he kept clicking it
and I have to ask right so I said what
is that and he said oh it’s a gratitude
counter and I said really and he said
yeah he said I click it every time
there’s something I’m thankful for so
that I could let Allah know that I am
thankful for the blessings that he’s
given me so I asked him well how many
times a day do you click this any
guesses I was blown away when he said
his average is 1,800 times a day 1,800
times a day he finds something to be
pretty grateful for and I think I’m
lucky if I can find three to five right
that’s tammer I’ve also had the
opportunity to cross the ocean twice
this year and go to Bangladesh
Bangladesh is a poor country in its own
right and it’s next door to Myanmar
there’s been a genocide that’s been
going on and rahega refugees have been
fleeing across to the country that’s
already poor well one of the stories
that I heard while I was there is a
farmer Bangladeshi farmer average wage a
dollar a day cleared trees off of his
land so that people could set up tents
there the refugees and he said when he
was asked why did you do this he said I
have enough and I wanted to be able to
share with people who have nothing there
are also children who are there without
their parents their parents were killed
they’ve been taken and I wondered if
there was an orphanage I wondered if
they were heads of household like they
are another
trees so I asked our guide what happens
to these kids with no parents she said
to me
they’re Rohan NGO welcomed them into
their families and they unfold them into
their families remember they have
nothing and they will still take other
kids into their family and take care of
them that’s such a blessing dr. Martin
Luther King jr. said everybody can be
great because everybody can serve mother
Teresa said if you can’t feed a hundred
feet just one and we all know Mother
Teresa and we know the great work that
she did but not everybody knows free to
build her and they should treatability
lived in Indianapolis during the 1920s
during the Depression we know that many
people in the United States struggled to
survive they lost our jobs they lost
their homes they lost the ability to
feed their families but some people did
have enough and they could share and
Frida was one of those who had enough
and she made it a point to keep jobs
available at her home so that when
people knocked on their her door and
said do you have some food she would say
yes but I need you to do this job first
Frida is my great grandmother and Frida
never started a food pantry
she never campaigned for public policy
changes in fact she didn’t even have to
cross the street to serve people came to
her whom I have loved watching my
children grow up and get a heart for
service my daughter Katie worked an
entry-level job saved her money for
months and then spent half of her annual
wage to go to Africa to work in an
orphanage my son Joshua was able to
teach a little boy across the street how
to swim now Joshua was born with some
pretty significant physical disabilities
he’s been in a wheelchair all his life
we didn’t think he was going to be able
to learn how to swim and he did it was
kind of scary actually because he looks
like he was drowning and he would kind
of flop around in the water and ended up
figuring out a way to kind of swim like
a mermaid or in his case a merman and
there was another little boy who had
disabilities that were similar to
Joshua’s and so somebody came to Joshua
and said could
help teach this little boy how to swim
and he said yes so the little boy it
mattered to him that Joshua would take
the time to teach him how to swim in his
own special style but it also mattered
to Joshua that he had an opportunity to
serve now I know the problems are
overwhelming I know that you can look
out there and say oh my gosh I don’t
know where to start this so much
there’s too much I know that you may be
thinking I don’t think I can cross the
ocean and start an orphanage or what if
I can’t adopt 20 kids it’s really okay
it’s okay you may be thinking again like
I said before that you have to be a
certain age or have a certain skill you
may think well when I have time well let
me tell you a secret
you’re not ever gonna get enough time
and you’re never we’re gonna get so much
money unless you win the lottery right
are you invest wisely that you’re gonna
have so much that you don’t know what to
do with them but the opportunities for
service are everywhere they’re
everywhere and you don’t need to do
something that takes five weeks or five
months or five years you can do
something that takes five minutes and it
makes the difference I want to tell you
about some people that I know who are
making a difference I know of a great
grandmother who lives in Sandy Utah
who’s made 4,000 quilts for babies all
over the world and she’s done it between
her 90th and 95th birthdays I have a
friend Helen who’s a retired
schoolteacher who has crossed the ocean
twice this year to go work in refugee
camps in both Turkey and Bangladesh I
have another friend Sarah she’s busy
with a young family and she saw the news
of what was going on in the world and
she felt like there was something she
could do for the kids and so she created
an organization called balls of Hope and
in two years almost 12,000 little dolls
and bears have gone to children all over
the world I also have a neighbor who
lives in our neighborhood and she serves
us by cutting flowers from her garden
and then taking them to us so that we
can enjoy her beautiful flowers and we
have a neighbor
who helped us a few years ago by letting
my husband cross the street and helping
him build a casket for our daughter I
have a neighbor who knocked on my door a
few years ago and she said I’ve been
thinking about you all day are you okay
and I said no I’m not okay my daughter
Angelia died this morning when we
adopted her she was missing most of her
brain she had seizures she was blind and
we totally loved her she was totally
adorable and we benefited and were
blessed by that neighbor who took five
minutes she didn’t even come in my house
to knock on my door and say are you okay
here’s my question for you we have needs
everywhere big and small is it your time
to cross the ocean or cross the street
thank you [Applause]
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