Holly and Jacob Sosa, of Alpena — currently fostering two toddlers with the help of their three children — were chosen as one of 31 families from across the state to be featured by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services as part of Foster Care Awareness Month. From hundreds of families nominated, officials selected the Sosas — nominated by Wellspring Lutheran Services — to be featured on the DHHS website and Facebook page on Sunday.

On Monday, the family’s case worker presented the family with a certificate, an engraved memento of the honor, and the promise of a two-night stay in the family suite of a Frankenmuth resort and water park.

The family usually has to rent two rooms to stay within hotel fire codes, Holly Sosa said, smiling, as her three kids celebrated the upcoming outing.

The Sosas became a foster family just over a year ago, their house already busy with three energetic kids.

News Photo by Julie Riddle The Sosa family -- mother Holly and father Jacob, plus children Evelyn, Aiden, and Collin, in striped shirt -- on Tuesday at Mich-e-ke-wis Park in Alpena celebrate exciting news after the family was recognized by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services during Foster Care Awareness Month.

Friends tell them they’ve taken on too big a challenge by choosing to foster.

“Absolutely, we’re taking on more than we can handle,” Holly Sosa said. “But, who else is going to? We have love to give. We have food to feed. We have beds to sleep in. Why wouldn’t we?”

Foster parents are in high demand, in Northeast Michigan and elsewhere. Before the Sosas had signed the last of their licensure paperwork, in January 2020, a phone call alerted them that a little boy needed them.

Soon afterward, his newborn sister joined the Sosa household.

For the protection of the birth parents — and to give foster kids the chance to write their own story as they grow up — the Sosa can’t share their foster children’s identity. The little boy they’ve dubbed “Cuddles,” and his sister has earned the nickname of “Mamacita.”

News Photo by Julie Riddle Displaying a certificate marking their selection as one of 31 families in Michigan to be recognized by a state agency during Foster Care Awareness Month, parents Jacob and Holly Sosa and children Collin, Aiden, and Evelyn, from left, smile for a family photo on Tuesday at Mich-e-ke-wis Park in Alpena.

Families need to go into fostering knowing the children in their care might not be with them forever, Jacob Sosa said.

“In that short time they’re with you, you just give them every inch of love that you can,” he said.

Babies sometimes scream, the toddlers’ foster siblings have been finding out.

Evelyn, 8, Aiden, 10, and Collin, 11, have more work to do with little ones in the house, they said, and the extra bodies sometimes mean extra chaos.

“It’s not the easiest thing in the world,” Aiden said. “It’s a lot of work. But …,”

“It’s worth it,” Collin chipped in.

Totally worth it, the boys agreed.

When the toddlers arrived, the little boy was uncommunicative and anxious. After more than a year in foster care, however, the boy talks and smiles, foster brother Collin said.

“They’re just living their best selves,” he reported proudly.

He and his siblings enthusiastically support their parents’ choice to foster, especially knowing foster children sometimes have tough times before they go into foster care.

“They’re running around, they’re playing, they’re acting like actual toddlers,” said Aiden. “And that’s really important. It’s really nice to see.”

Children of foster families get to experience, first-hand, the difference they are making in another child’s life — and that gives them a lot of joy, Collin said, before the threesome scampered off to the playground with their foster siblings.

Though fairly new to fostering, the Sosas hope to someday buy a bigger house with more land where they can invite other children to stay with them a while, heal from trauma, and be loved.

They want to help take care of the children’s biological parents, too, encouraging them in their efforts to bring their children home, the foster parents said.

“At the end of it all, parenting is a joy,” Holly Sosa said, “And, what better way to love your neighbor than by taking care of their babies?”

To learn more about the Sosa family or other Michigan foster families, visit fcnp.org/news-events/family-share or facebook.com/fostercarenavigatorprogram.