Heart Gallery in Lutz dozens of smiling faces of children looking for their forever home

LUTZ, Fla. - There are more than 3,000 kids waiting to be adopted in Hillsborough County, and a powerful exhibit at St. Timothy's Catholic Church in Lutz is hoping to lower that number. It features dozens of smiling faces looking for their forever home. 

Every one of the bright-eyed kids featured in the Heart Gallery display has a story. The hope is that someone will see them and want to make them a part of theirs. 

Heart Gallery's Executive Director Lindsay Hermida said the exhibit travels to 20 different venues every year including airports, libraries and small businesses.

"The Heart Gallery’s mission is to simply raise awareness about the children who are waiting for forever families in our county," Hermida said. "I think just putting a face to a really difficult problem it just becomes real for people." 

It became real about a year ago for Kelly when she got a text from her pal Lindsay.

"We got a text on a Tuesday afternoon, and she asked if we still had an empty bedroom, and she needed a favor," Kelly said. 

Adoption was always an option for Kelly and her husband Allen. They married later in life and weren't sure they'd be able to have children of their own. They were blessed with a biological daughter, but felt their family still wasn't complete.

"When we took all the fear out of it we just kept coming up with those three things, we have a home, we can put food in that belly, and we have a lot of love to give," Kelly said. "So, I wouldn’t say it was an easy decision, but once we actually kind of boiled down to what this meant to our family it was an easy decision at that point." 

They took in a 10-year-old boy named Mathew. A year and 10 days later, they finalized the adoption. 

"The love that we received from that child almost instantly and the growth that you see day after day with him having this consistent home and this family that loves him and invests in him, you can’t help but do more and want to be a bigger part of it," Kelly explained. 

One memory in particular sticks with her.

"We were driving down Dale Mabry [Highway] one day, and he said ‘mom,’ and I didn’t answer him, because for nine months he’d been calling me Kelly. He said ‘mom,’ and I said ‘yeah?’ ‘can I have a snack when I get home?’" Kelly explained through tears. 

When they got home he called her husband, dad.

"My husband and I laid in bed that night and cried together," she said. "It’s worth the rough days when you see this boy who you know on his own all of a sudden felt comfortable enough with us and our love and our home and our daughter to just call us mom and dad." 

Now, she can't imagine life without Mathew and wants to share her experience with others contemplating adoption.

"Your fear has to be put aside to know the love that you can give a child," she said.

Hillsborough County has the highest number of kids in foster care in the state of Florida. 

"The need for adoptive homes, the need for foster homes is really dire right now," Hermida said. "If you can’t adopt you can foster, if you can’t foster you can volunteer’ if you can’t volunteer you can donate." 

Since 2005, The Heart Gallery has helped find homes for 326 children. Five more will be adopted on National Adoption Day coming up on November 18.