HOULTON – It’s tough being a teenager. It’s even tougher when you’re homeless and have a 6-month-old baby.

That’s how it was for Ingrid, 16, of Jonesport, who with her now 9-month-old son wondered where she was going to sleep each night and what she was going to eat.

She said Tuesday that she missed the first eight months of her son’s life while she tried to survive or do things like other teenagers.

Stepping Stones, a residential and transitional living program offered by Maine Adoption Placement Service, will open two new facilities later this year in Houlton.

They will serve women like Ingrid aged 15 to 25 from across the state who want to get back on their feet and develop the life skills they need to succeed.

Ingrid has been in the program for a month.

During that time, she has earned her GED and is learning how to be a good parent.

Stepping Stones, formerly called My Choice, has been running since 1999 in a cramped facility in a converted garage at the Maine Adoption Placement Services office on Pleasant Street.

Next month, the residential program will move into new quarters in the former Christian Science church at 2 High St.

In November, the transitional living apartments next door will open to provide the second step for young women preparing to move back into the community.

The half-million dollar project is being funded by federal and state grants.

“We’re the missing link,” Luetta Goodall, Stepping Stones program director, said Tuesday, taking a break from moving boxes into the former church.

Contrary to what some people think, she said, Stepping Stones is not a program to teach young women how to live on the welfare system.

Rather, it is intended to connect women with services and skills they need to live independently.

Cooking, sewing, child care, education, work and volunteering all are components of the program in which participants must carry their weight with household chores and responsibilities.

“It’s everything from making a bed to making a budget,” Goodall said.

Program fees are paid for through a Medicaid program, and girls who have some money also pay for a portion of their rent, Goodall said.

A portion of the rent is set aside so that when participants move back into their communities they will have some money to set up housekeeping.

Over the past several months, the former church has been remodeled and now includes a second floor where there will be bedrooms for six women and their babies. The main floor will include a kitchen, dining area, offices and a large open living space.

The transition facility next door at 6 High St. will have three two-bedroom apartments, where residents will live for up to 18 months before moving out into the community.

The facility is intended to provide the women with more independent living as they put to use the skills they learned in the residential program, yet it provides the full-time support of trained professionals.

“Compared to how some of these girls have had to live, this will be like the Taj Mahal,” said Luanne Dwyer, who will oversee the transitional living program.

“Homelessness in the Houlton area is serious,” Dwyer said. “It’s a big problem.

“We have kids coming from all over the state,” she continued. “Houlton seems to be a magnet for homeless kids.”

Both buildings will be staffed 24 hours a day.

Attached to the transitional-living apartments will be a youth drop-in center. The center will offer youths in the Houlton area, and particularly those who are homeless, a place with computers for employment research or preparing resumes, phones, laundry and bathrooms, healthy snacks, and the opportunity to participate in life-skills classes, Dwyer said.

“This is not just a program where you can walk in and walk out,” Ingrid said. “Stepping Stones really slaps you with reality.”