James, Matthew, Nicholas, Olivia and Nicole Angiolino gather with a photo of Joey, the inspiration for Joey’s Little Angels.
By Nicole DiMentri
Ever since James and Nicole Angiolino lost their 15-month-old son to a rare genetic disease known as Hurler’s Syndrome five years ago, they make sure Joey is included in everything they do.
Whether it is including a photo of him in new family photos or through the family’s nonprofit Joey’s Little Angels, the Angiolinos have been successful in keeping Joey’s memory alive. They do it with every black T-shirt with little white wings, with gifts to thousands of sick children and donations to parents struggling with medical bills.
The Angiolinos started Joey’s Little Angels five years ago, and as time went on, its focus turned toward helping out local children. Nicole and James are both teachers in the Hamilton School District and found out about kids sick in their own schools. One of the many local families they helped this past year included a Reynolds Middle School student who had his leg amputated during cancer treatment.
To date, the organization has raised over $50,000 for families with sick children and Duke Pediatric Bone Marrow Transplant Family Support Program. They also have donated close to 2,000 toys from their annual holiday toy drive to Duke University Hospital, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, The Hospital for Sick Children at Capital Health, St. Christopher’s Hospitals and Robert Wood Johnson Hospital, New Brunswick.
One of their longest running events, the toy drive has grown from one hospital to now five in just four years. All of the presents are packed into donated refrigerator boxes and loaded onto James’ pick-up truck to be delivered either to the hospital or the post office. Usually James takes time off to deliver the presents to the children, but recently his former students have taken over that job.
“This year we had two of my former students deliver the presents to the kids,” James said. “It was really special because Joe (one of the students) went to CHOP earlier that year for a brain operation and this was his way of giving back to the kids and thanking the hospital.”
The toy drive started when Joey was at Duke University Hospital receiving treatment. James and Nicole had left their teaching jobs and their eldest son Nicholas to be with Joey. At Duke, he received a chord blood transplant. While the family was in North Carolina, the hospital celebrated “Christmas in July,” and had all of the children write down their wish list of toys, as well as their siblings.
“It was such a nice gesture and made things more normal for us,” Nicole said. “They didn’t forget about Nicholas while Joey was sick, and that meant a lot.”
So when the Angiolinos decided to do a toy drive, they made sure that not only sick children would get presents, but their siblings would, too.
Like with every event Joey’s Little Angels holds, the toy drive keeps growing. On Nov. 29 this year, the drive will include live reindeer, crafts and Santa. Wegman’s has come on board as a partner. James and Nicole would love people to bring along toys to donate in order to reach their goal of more than 2,500 toys this year.
Another successful event has been their Maniac Mud Run in July, which has grown from 10 participants to 185 in just two years. With participants already signing up for next year’s Mud Run, the Angiolino’s expect to have more than 300 runners.
Their biggest event is their 5th Annual Fundraiser, expected to host 400-500 people next April at the Stone Terrace. The fundraiser is around Joey’s birthday, and celebrates his life by raising money through auctions and giveaways.
Since last appearing in the Hamilton Post in 2012, the Angiolino household has added two more smiling faces, Matthew and Olivia, who are now three-years-old. Nicholas is now 7, and his parents said he is “easily the most compassionate kid.” All three of Joey’s siblings love and remember their brother every day.
How does the future look? Well besides from hoping to donate to 10 hospitals for the toy drive and gaining more runners in the Mud Run, James didn’t hesitate, “The future for us is simple. We just want to find more kids that we can help out, especially locally, because parents with sick kids aren’t seeking for help. We were the same when Joey was sick, but bills pile up and if we can help families with that, that’d mean everything. Just helping one child means the world to us.”
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