LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WHAS11) – It was a joyous welcome for Santa and his elves at the Wayside Christian Mission on Christmas Eve. With the help of the Louisville community, Santa brought presents for all the Mission's residents, spending their holiday at the shelter.
"Yes, a very merry Christmas I know that tomorrow when we wake up in the morning they will be able to open some things and enjoy the kindness and generosity of people who gave," mom Love Beverly said.
This will be Beverly and her family's first Christmas at Wayside.
"It made you feel like you were family in the midst of everything that's going on especially when you come on hard times and you don't necessarily have family that are around you, its really a family-oriented atmosphere. So I had a really good time," Beverly said.
"I think it was kind of fun just to see how nice these people were just to come and give us presents, and give us all this stuff because they have to get all this, but they chose to be kind enough and give us all these presents so I'm just happy that they did this," Love's son Demeiko Beverly said.
This will be Darlene Gill's 30th Christmas spent volunteering at Wayside. She says it's become one of her family's favorite holiday traditions.
"My husband is an elf, my granddaughter is an elf. We love it, we love it," Gill said. "It's definitely a tradition that I would never want to miss and its giving back and honestly I want my kids to know how blessed that we are and if this is my way of giving back that's what we like to do. We sponsor families also."
Wayside Christian Mission's COO Nina Moseley says this year nearly 600 men, women, and children received Christmas gifts thanks to generous sponsors and dedicated volunteers.
"For a lot of our folks this is the only Christmas that they have and we want to make sure that while they are here at Wayside Christian Mission they have a good memory," Moseley said.
