Meet Sadie Keller, an 8-year old who was diagnosed with leukemia early 2015. She spent her first month in the hospital and then had some weekly chemotherapy treatments.
After 2 and ½ years of treatment, Sadie figured out how unhappy she would be if she wakes up in the hospital on Christmas morning. In line with this, she launched a toy drive dubbed, “Sadie’s Sleigh” to make sure that every kid in the hospital would experience the same kind of Christmas that they would at home.
She began her effort by posting a video around November 29 which her mom shared on Facebook. She was blown away when the boxes of donations came and her 300 toys goal became 1,276. Some even came from across the country with personal notes from people who had also battled cancer or re battling cancer. All encouraging and praising Sadie for what she is doing. No doubt, Sadie touched a lot of people, not only the children that received gifts, but also all the people that were able to watch her video.
Her mother said, “The thing that warms my heart the most is that she doesn’t get it at all. She doesn’t get that what she is doing is special”
“It just kind of stopped me in my tracks and really kind of made me never doubt her power of what she can do throughout this journey,” she said. “She has touched so many people.”
She personally lined up all the gifts that were collected. They lined it up in their driveway and a moving company donated a van to haul all the gifts from their home to the hospital, to be given away to the other children.
Come Christmas morning, every child in the hospital will receive three gifts and one for the child’s sibling. You can just imagine the joy that these children feel when they wake up with three gifts. The mere fact that Sadie thought about this is very heartwarming. For someone in her position to think about others, is something very rare.
This girl certainly deserves a big hand of applause.
All images via Today.
