Little Mister Five Hills picks up the tab for Ronald McDonald House
By WENDY SLEDD
Special to the Leader-Press
Five-year-old Swayze Gray struggled to survive every day for the first 30 days of his life. While the youngster may be too young to remember, Swayze’s mother, Sara Gray, remembers every day that he was in the neonatal intensive care unit until she and her husband could finally bring him home.
While Swayze spent the first month of his life in the NICU, the Gray family stayed, a no cost, in the nearby Ronald McDonald House which allowed them to remain close to their hospitalized son. To pay her appreciation forward, Gray selected the charity of Ronald McDonald House for Swayze to advocate on behalf of during his yearlong reign as Little Mister Five Hills.
“Collecting pop tabs is a simple task that really makes a big difference for families of current NICU patients,” Gray said. “It also allows an opportunity to spread awareness as many people are unfamiliar with the Ronald McDonald House unless they have been in need of the services it provides.”
Swayze and his mom placed collection jars in more than two dozen locations throughout area including businesses, government offices, schools, civic clubs, and others collecting pop tabs for Ronald McDonald House.
“Swayze’s confidence has grown exponentially in the last year. Swayze’s communication skills have absolutely sky rocketed,” Gray said. “Swayze boldly asks anyone to help him collect pop tabs.
He is also able to understand and explain to others why he is collecting pop tabs. Conversations about pop tabs easily led to sharing much more.”
In addition to local businesses and the community collecting tabs, titleholders in the Miss Five Hills Scholarship Program also collected. It costs nothing to collect pop tabs and it can be done by anyone regardless of age or location, says Gray.
“Collecting pop tabs has been an amazing age-appropriate activity to teach Swayze about community service. It has allowed Swayze to practice putting others before himself, and exercise compassion,” Gray said.
Swayze and the royalty delivered the pop tabs to the Ronald McDonald House using three wagons to pull in the 124.31 pounds of tabs, equivalent to 140,222 individual tabs valued at more than $700 that will be used to cover the house’s expenses including utilities, food, and more.
“Swayze’s platform has given him opportunities to meet and build relationships with so many people in and around our community. Swayze has made connections that will long out last his one-year reign,” Gray said. “Swayze has been able to build a support system that will surely grow as he grows.
For every person, we are extremely grateful for the positive influence and support of Swayze as he collected pop tabs to benefit the Ronald McDonald House.”
Miss Five Hills Scholarship titleholders have collected and donated more than one million pop tabs to the Ronald McDonald House over the last eight years.