5/12/2023 Foundry Giving Friday: Avenues For Youth - ConneQT Home

5/12/2023 Foundry Giving Friday: Avenues For Youth - ConneQT Home

Every Friday The Foundry Home Goods contributes 5% of our total sales to a different community-nominated small-and-mighty cause. This Friday's Foundry Giving Friday recipient? Avenues For Youth - ConneQT Home.

We've been thinking a lot about mothers this season. There are so many different ways to be a mother, to give and to receive care, and so many paths and journeys on the way towards, into, out of, or away from motherhood. The true gift and opportunity of mothering is, of course, to build worlds that allow the space for all. This month, our Foundry Giving Fridays will be dedicated to uplifting those who work tirelessly to build the world all of its children deserve.

This week's recipient: Avenues For Youth's ConneQT Host Home program, gives youth in need of housing—with a specific focus on LGBTQI+ youth—the power to decide where they live within their community. In their own words:

ConneQT is a host home program that provides LGBTQI+ youth culturally responsive housing within their community of choice. In ConneQT, youth choose which community member they live with and those community members provide housing and food. We know that the concept of sharing resources and taking care of each other is nothing new to queer and trans folx. It has been a cultural practice for many other communities who experience oppression and violence. We want to grow our community of hosts, and strengthen connections with those in community who are already supporting youth through sharing their homes.

YES. Avenues For Youth has supported young people ages 16-24 for over 25 years, providing stable housing, building trusted relationships, and partnering with each human on an individual level to advocate for (and working together building the skillsets to advocate for themselves) in navigating education, career, health and wellness, and housing goals. A house is a house and food is food and humans require those, baseline, for survival. And yet...we also see Avenues For Youth adding these necessary additional layers of support— inclusion, belonging, community, safety, and agency—in addition to the crucial basics, and we are here for it. This is mothering.

If you don't need anything from us, please consider donating directly to Avenues for Youth here. If you do find yourself in need of anything from us know that your purchase goes to support good change happening on the community level.

And if you feel the call and have the inclination to join a community of support and belonging, ConneQT is always looking for host homes.

Thanks to Anna for the nomination!

If YOU have a worthy cause to nominate for our Foundry Giving Friday initiative, pop on over to our Nomination Page and drop us a line. We're all in this together.

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