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On Saturday, the D.C. Child and Family Services Agency hosted a party celebrating the 39th National Adoption Day.Dionne’s Good Food on Oak Drive SE was packed with families enjoying food, face painting, balloon animals, games and dance performances.
The event honored the children and youth who were adopted in Washington, D.C. over the last fiscal year.
“We had 63 this year, they found their forever families,” said Tanya Torres Trice, acting director of Child and Family Services. “Today they have forever families.”
One of those adoptions that happened this year was in May, that’s when Darryl Wise became Christopher’s father.
“The first time I laid eyes on Christopher is when he was placed with me,” said Wise. “He looked at me crying. I looked at him crying.”
Wise smiled and said he and the now 20-month-old both agreed to take on this together.
Wise, who himself was in foster care, said he was taken in by a wonderful foster family who taught him to pay it forward.
The oldest person to be adopted in D.C. this year was 18-year-old Olivia Thomas.
She met her mom thanks to school friends, who are now her sisters.
“It was one of the best moments of my life,” said Olivia. “I finally found the stability and everything else I’ve been looking for my whole life and I finally got it with her.”
Bernadine Thomas-Brown, who has five other living children, said as soon as Olivia walked through her door three years ago, she was her daughter.
“I told her you never have to worry about being abused, about being hurt, being belittled or anything. I’m only gonna give you my love,” said Thomas-Brown.
With pride, Olivia’s mom bragged about her grades and said she’s already been accepted in several colleges.
There are 520 children in foster care in the District of Columbia and few understand what goes into the effort to take care of them more than Ann Reilly, who is Deputy of In and Out Care at Child and Family Services.
“Days like today we hold on to for all the hard days in between,” said Reilly. “I adopted my daughter Natasha in 2014 at Adoption Day. She was 19 years old, she turned 30 years old last Friday.”
If you would like to bring love into your house and family through adoption visit cfsa.dc.gov or call 202-671-LOVE.
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