Our Chief Development Officer, Kari Hopkins, recently had a little Q&A with founding board member Pete Cummings and his wife Brenda, at one of our staff meetings.
K: How did the two of you get involved with Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries?
B: We moved here from the Kansas City area 33 years ago, to a place in the country that was very near Larry & Cathy’s home. Larry invited us to church, and we started going there with the McDaniel’s. As we got to know each other, Larry started sharing their vision for ministering to children.
P: I remember chatting many, many evenings on the phone after Larry got home from work, about all their plans for a children’s home. Larry & Cathy were so excited about the opportunity for a ministry to kids. Larry invited me to be one of the founding board members, which was an unbelievable honor.
K: What drew you to come alongside the ministry? Was it something Larry said, or the way he presented it?
B: It’s all he ever talked about! He was so passionate about it and had such a vision. And Cathy was just a magnet for kids. Every Sunday after church, kids were arguing over who would get to go home with the McDaniels for the afternoon.
K: What other things did you do to be involved in the ministry besides being on the board?
P: We did a bit of everything. We just figured things out day by day and everyone did whatever was needed. As a board member, I remember that our first budget was $12,000 for the year, and we were worried that we wouldn’t be able to raise that much. Larry would sing and preach at local churches and Brenda would sit at a table with info about Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries, to help spread the word about the new ministry. Today, Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries is a household name around mid-Missouri, but back then, no one had heard of it, so we did lots of different things to help spread the word.
B: I coordinated Christmas for years – it was one of the highlights. We were also relief home parents. Actually, the only relief home parents in the beginning. One time in the mid 1990s, when a set of home parents left rather unexpectedly, Pete and I moved our family into Larry’s house until Bill & Tammy Atherton were hired.
P: That’s one of my favorite stories that Bill probably doesn’t like me to tell! So, I was at work during the day. The evening I came home from work and saw Bill there with some of the kids that first time, I went in the kitchen and asked Brenda, “Who’s the new kid out there?” Even though we were licensed foster parents in our own home for 12 years, at that point, I felt like I didn’t know much about caring for children from hard places. But that first night that Bill and Tammy came to see if they wanted the home parent job, we were dealing with some very tough stuff with a sibling group. I was trying to help them, but wasn’t having much luck. Bill walked in to do what he could to help. He was young, inexperienced, hadn’t been a parent or had any training, but when he sat down with those kids, I knew immediately that God had sent the Athertons. Bill’s demeanor and way with the children that night was just amazing.
K: Was there a time in all of that when you felt most used by God?
B: I loved being with the kids, and we were able to do that a lot in the beginning. Besides doing relief parenting, we also were the youth leaders at our church, so we worked with the kids a lot. It was so rewarding, developing those relationships and seeing the growth and improvement in each child.
P: My memories of those early board meetings were…wow. There were meetings when we literally just spent the entire time praying. There was Cathy’s cancer and another board member dealing with cancer in his family, and then always the financial concerns. Sometimes there wasn’t even enough money to buy milk. Many board meetings were spent in prayer, because there just didn’t seem to be anything else to do. We made a lot of mistakes, but we didn’t quit and God worked through it.
K: What are some of your favorite memories?
B: I would take the kids Christmas shopping – that was an event doing it all by myself! But it was really great memories. For a few years, our family would take breakfast over to the Atherton’s home on Christmas day. I also processed the newsletter and Isabel Cochran helped – we would often pray over them while we were doing it.
P: I remember when the Zimmers decided to donate the current property where Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries now sits. Larry had an old Dodge pickup, and there was snow on the ground. He wanted to show the board around the new property, but we wouldn’t all fit in his truck. Mary Foutz and I rode in the back of the truck, then Phil Wyatt and Doug Phillips rode up front with Larry. We drove down into this huge ditch (where the lake dam/driveway now exists) and drove up in the woods where the current homes sit. Larry excitedly told us where each home could be built. He could envision all of it…but all I could see was a bunch of trees and ditches. He had such a vision for all of it…I’ll never forget that exciting day.
K: What does 30 years of ministry mean to you? You were new to the area when it began and you’ve been able to watch all of it.
B: I love seeing how it’s grown through the years, and thinking about how many children have been touched by Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries – that’s what blesses me.
P: If I had to sum it up, I’d say there are very few things that come close to the level of importance Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries has been in my life. I’ve played a very small part the past 30 years, but besides my family, I count my involvement in Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries as one of the most precious things in my life. It’s been so important because I’ve seen what God has done and watched His faithfulness through everything. It wasn’t always easy by any means. But there were lots of fun and wonderful times.
“Pete and Brenda’s contribution to the work of Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries is immeasurable. We’ve been through so much together, I can’t even begin to explain. There are people like the Cummings and some others that helped make Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries happen. There’s no other way it could have existed without folks like them walking through life with us in those beginning years. I can’t thank them enough for continuing to play a part today.”
Larry McDaniel, Founder and CEO of Coyote Hill Foster Care Ministries
