L-R: Camp Smile-A-Mile Program Director Jennifer Amundsen receives copies of “Billy the Kitten and Travis Too” from Levi Bates and author Elena Caudle. (Photo courtesy Caitlyn Colburn/Serendipitous)
CULLMAN – Elena Caudle and Bethany Kerr, the local author/artist duo who created the children’s books “Serendipitous” and “Serendipitous Too!” again teamed up with childhood cancer survivor Levi Bates for a book drive to provide copies of their new book “Billy the Kitten and Travis Too” free of charge to patients at Children’s Hospital in Birmingham. Last week, “Team Levi” delivered 555 copies of the new book to children who will be spending Christmas at Children’s, Camp Smile-A-Mile’s recreation/education center childhood cancer patients, the Ronald McDonald House and the physical therapy clinic where team leader Bates is a patient.
In 2016, the first drive sent more than 250 books to Children’s Hospital. Last year, the team didn’t make a very ambitious goal of 525, but still delivered 482 books. The 2018 goal of 500 was surpassed with plenty of room to spare.
Bates, the teenage driving force behind the book drive, is a childhood cancer survivor and has been a patient at Children’s Hospital and the therapy clinic. In a message at the outset of this year’s drive, he wrote:
“I’ve spent so much time at Children’s Hospital over the last few years and they have been so good to, and for, me that that I want to ‘give back’ to them in some way. These books are full of funny stories about cute critters and they’ve made me smile a million times and I think anything that makes a kid smile is a good thing to ‘give back,’ don’t you?”
At Camp Smile-A-Mile, the delivery team was met by CSAM Program Director Jennifer Amundsen. After receiving the books, she told Caudle, “This is the kind of thing that makes me smile!”
After returning from the delivery, Bates wrote, “We had a great morning at Children’s delivering the books for all the amazing kids that will be spending Christmas in the hospital. It’s such a great experience to be able to give back! Looking forward to making some more smiles next year!”
On Thursday, Caudle told The Tribune, “I never thought I’d be old enough to say something like this, but as cheesy as it sounds, there really is no way to give away a smile or love or joy without getting a whole lot back in return! We are beyond grateful to this community and our friends nationwide for helping us with this opportunity to give away a lot of all three! And as Levi said: ‘Can’t wait to see what we can do next year!’”
Find out more at www.facebook.com/Serendipitousness.
Copyright 2018 Humble Roots, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
