Christmas is still months away, but Olympic Peninsula children and families have already begun to fill special shoeboxes with gifts for children in need around the world.

Two Sequim residents recently did just that in Quito, Ecuador, a mountain city at 9,500 feet surrounded by a ring of volcanoes. In early June, Paul Muncey and Susan Hedding helped to distribute some of these gift-filled shoeboxes to children in Quito.

“It filled my heart to see how much excitement and joy these small gifts brought to the children who have so much less than us,” Muncey said.

While gifts are collected in the U.S. and other countries during the Christmas season, it takes several months to distribute all of them around the world. Last year, 2,172 shoeboxes were collected in Sequim and 4,858 from across the Olympic Peninsula, contributing to a worldwide total of 11.3 million gifts.

Distributions of those shoebox gifts are now underway in 170 countries.

Operation Christmas Child is a project of Samaritan’s Purse, designed to deliver gift-filled shoeboxes to children around the world in Jesus’ name.

For more information about Operation Christmas Child on the Olympic Peninsula, call 206-817-5636.

Samaritan’s Purse, based in Boone, North Carolina, responds to the physical and spiritual needs of those in crisis.

For more information about the organization, visit samaritanspurse.org or call 800-528-1980.

Benji Mullen of Sequim carries his gift-filled shoebox to be sent to a child far away.

Photo courtesy of Operation Christmas Child / A young girl in Quito, Ecuador, opens her Operation Christmas Child shoebox.