Lehigh Valley Reilly Children’s Hospital – Cedar Crest hosted more than 50 families of pediatric patients and their siblings for a Halloween party through the Spirit of Children organization Oct. 17. Activities at the party included free costumes for the kids to choose from and dress up in and Halloween activities, crafts and games.

Halloween retailer Spirit Halloween, through its Spirit of Children program, raises funds in store and online to benefit Lehigh Valley Reilly Children’s Hospital’s child life department. With this support, child life specialists work to reduce stress and anxiety while kids are in the hospital. Spirit of Children hosted Halloween parties across the U.S. and Canada this year.

Last year, Spirit of Children provided $112,800 to the child life program at Lehigh Valley Reilly Children’s Hospital bringing the total to more than $983,000 over the past 10 years. These funds have been used to help patients, parents, caregivers and siblings feel more at ease about surgeries, clinic appointments and hospital stays. It also enables the child life team to ensure kids are meeting developmental and educational milestones while undergoing treatment by providing for distraction and relaxation tools, medical play, special events, pet therapy, playrooms and more.

Previous support from Spirit of Children has been used to purchase arts and crafts, gifts, dolls for educational purposes and KindVR headsets, which use virtual reality to help children relax during medical treatments.

Spirit of Children has been making hospitals less scary for children and their families since 2006 by providing fun and funding to child life departments within children’s hospitals. It started with Halloween parties at 11 hospitals in 2006. Today the organization has more than 150 partner hospitals across the United States and Canada.