JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A Jacksonville company is putting smiles on children’s faces for Halloween.
A team of architects, engineers, artists and volunteers built costumes for five kids with special needs and got help from a local nonprofit.
Isaac Toenies and his little brother Adrian are ready to trick-or-treat in style this year.
“He loves all the colors and how fast it moves,” said Isaac’s mother, Beth Toenies, about her son’s costume. “It’s aerodynamic, which is really cool.”
Isaac’s special costume is a salute to his dad, Mike Toenies, who is a US Navy petty officer first class. Mike just returned home from a six-month deployment.
“I thought maybe it would bring them a little closer together by both being in a plane that’s very similar,” Beth said.
“I think he sat right up, and he put his hands on the front dash,” Mike said.
Isaac and four other children are this year’s recipients of Halloween costumes created by a team of architects, engineers and other volunteers at a Jacksonville company called RS&H, Inc. The costumes are for kids with special needs in wheelchairs, and the company got help from nonprofit Centers of Independent Living Jacksonville for the seventh consecutive year. Each of the costumes was free to the recipients and took two months to build.
Brandon Pourch is one of the architects and says after seven years of doing this, it never gets old.
“It just touches your heart and brings joy to you,” he said.
Beth says 3-year-old Isaac has an undiagnosed neuro-muscular genetic disorder.
It is like cerebral palsy. Isaac cannot speak, walk on his own, and needs a feeding tube, along with some other challenges.
But his parents say he loves his Halloween costume. It is a replica of the aircraft Mike uses for missions in the Navy.
“We fly the P8-Alpha Poseidon,” Mike said. “It is a Boeing aircraft that was made specifically for the Navy. [Isaac’s costume] has the logos of my current squadron: the world-famous Patrol Squadron (VP) 45 Pelicans.”
It is a Halloween surprise that is bringing smiles to plenty of faces.
“We are in a lonely walk that we’re going through with being a special-needs family,” Beth said. “The community rallies behind us and helps bring a little bit of normalcy and this gives us a reason to smile.”
“It brings their families joy,” Pourch said. “But everyone who helps out on the projects keep coming back to volunteer because it does bring them joy as well.”
It gives everyone involved a reason to celebrate.