"I set my own personal goal for the number of toys to get," Krug told stlouisblues.com. "I talked to Ryan O'Reilly about it and he said 'oh, we're going to crush that number.' And we did. The guys were very generous and that says a lot about them."
Thanks to personal contributions from the players, the Blues were able to provide nearly 600 toys to local childrens' hospitals in time for Christmas. The gifts were purchased from a wishlist provided by the patients and were made available through a free pop-up toy store inside the hospitals. Patients who were able to leave their rooms could shop at the toy stores through Christmas Day, while patients who were unable to leave their rooms received a gift delivered to them.
The Blues used the leftover donations to purchase more than 200 gift cards from locally-owned restaurants, which were given to families who are spending the holidays in the hospital with their children.
"We figured we could feed some of the families with the money that was left over," Krug said. "By purchasing gift cards to St. Louis restaurants, the parents can have a nice-cooked meal and we can support the restaurant owners and staff in the process.
"I'm thankful the guys took the opportunity to take part in this," Krug added. "We're going to help out a lot of people this time of year, especially with the climate we're in with the COVID situation. A lot of people have been affected differently, but we're doing what we can to make them happy and give them a good Christmas."
