For the Season 5 finale of the IDEA Vault Podcast, Amanda Johnson and Brittany Owings share how Fostering Hope began with a moment they couldn’t forget: seeing a child displaced from their home with their belongings packed in a garbage bag. When Vine Church was asked to help provide bags for children entering foster care, the question quickly became something much bigger. Amanda and Brittany got connected and began looking at the difficult transitions foster children experience, the needs DHR cannot always immediately meet, and the foster parents stepping in to be the hands and feet of their community. From essentials during an unexpected placement to making sure a child is remembered with a Walmart gift card on their birthday, Fostering Hope is working to make an incredibly hard season feel a little less uncertain. As that mission was taking shape, the 2026 Idea Empowerment Competition came along at just the right time. Amanda entered Fostering Hope and was awarded $7,000 as the first-place winner, with funding provided by the Regions Foundation. Now, Amanda and Brittany have created the "Healing Heart Threads Care Closet", a physical storefront in Troy designed to bridge the gap between foster children, foster families, DHR, and a community ready to help. In this Season 5 finale, they share how one tug on the heart became a growing local mission- and the promise behind the work: “No more garbage bags in Pike County.”

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