Local Residents Share Holiday Spirit With Children’s Hospital

 Thanksgiving Day four years ago, parents on the oncology floor at Children’s Hospital in Birmingham were digging in pockets and purses for change to feed vending machines that would provide their only sustenance because the hospital cafeteria was closed.Even most restaurants in downtown Birmingham were closed for the holiday.

For the last three years, a few families from Gadsden and Birmingham have been replacing that unpleasant holiday tradition with something a bit more palatable: a hot meal, with an extra serving of hope.

Gadsden residents Johnny and Dixie Phillips, along with their children and a few other families of cancer survivors, began Thanksgiving/Christmas Blessing as a ministry for families bound to Children’s Hospital on the holidays.

“Ideally, we’d rather them be home for the holidays,” Dixie Phillips said. “But since they can’t be, we go in and feed the children on the cancer and stem-cell floors, whatever family is in the room that day and the nurses.”Read More;http://www.gadsdentimes.com/article/20091125/NEWS/911259990/1017/NEWS?Title=Local-residents-share-holiday-s

Local Residents Share Holiday Spirit With Children’s Hospital