5 Years of Serving Moms and Babies!

Celebrating 5 years!

We recently celebrated our 5 Year Birthday with a party at In My Shoes with past and current moms and staff, donors, volunteers, and board members. During that time, Executive Director, Maria Puccini gave a talk to commemorate these five years. For those not able to make it, it’s written here! Enjoy and thank you for your support these 5 years! 

Thank you for being here today to celebrate 5 years of opening our doors to pregnant women in need of a safe space to journey through pregnancy. 

I also want to thank our planning committee for stepping up to put on this event and getting several things donated like the Chick-Fil-A and Central Market food. If you are here today, you have been an important part of In My Shoes. In the audience we have past and current moms, staff, and board members. We have dedicated donors and volunteers. I want to give a big thank you to all of you. We would not be here for 5 years without you.

You may have noticed in our marketing for this event the image of a footprint. Footprints are more than just an image for In My Shoes. Every Tuesday night, our moms and residential core team come together for Community night dinner. There, moms are presented with footprints, which signify accomplishments, goals reached, or significant milestones. You may have seen these on the residents’ doors if you took a tour today. 

For our moms, they receive footprints for things like 6 months of sobriety, getting a job, or getting a driver’s license. Our babies also get them for things like rolling over, smiling, or starting to crawl. I even have some granted to me that are hanging above my desk: bought a home, and, my favorite – becoming a mom to Michael Anthony. 

If I were to grant all of In My Shoes some footprints for our milestones in the past 5 years, they are: 

• housed 80 moms
• provided over 18,000 safe sleep nights for moms and babies
• reached a full-time non-residential staff of 5
• recruited and hired over 30 residential Core Team members who have given at least a year of service to In My Shoes
• weathered countless storms – both the kind that bring down trees and the kind that form our hearts
• have raised over $2 million to support these efforts

And as we celebrate these accomplishments, we have taken time this year to look ahead and set some new Bold Goals. Our goals include not only serving more moms, but also increasing the average length of stay of our moms from 150 days to 225 days. We’re going to do this in 3 phases. 

• Stabilize our current organization by:
  • Refining our current programs and services
  • Forming a consistent pipeline of staff, particularly the residential staff
• Optimize our spaces and our people to be good stewards of our gifts and serve moms in the best way possible.
• Expand: look at opportunities for housing more moms at one time. 

You all have made your footprint on this organization already. If we are to accomplish these goals, we will need you and your friends to help us. These efforts will require a major increase in funding over the next 3 years. In My Shoes has been successful because you have spread the word. Join us and stay with us as we make our mark in DFW for years to come. 

Thank you, again, for all our supporters have done for us over the last 5 years. We could not be here without you! 

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