"It's a blessing to be able to give back to where you came from," Jennifer Hudson said, "to turn something so sad into such a blessing."

Julia Hudson started the foundation and toy giveaway "to kind of help us heal," she said Monday.

She and her sister greeted thousands of children who came to the Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center in the South Side's West Pullman neighborhood for a little Christmas cheer.
"The best part is just seeing the happy faces of the kiddies," Jennifer Hudson said.

A line started forming at 3 a.m. and eventually stretched into the community center's parking lot, where families stood bundled in the cold. The families, some with tiny babies, were ushered into waiting rooms where they sat, in some cases for hours, before making it to a room where each child chose one toy.

Organizers said the drive had 50,000 toys to give away this year, the most ever. WGN-TV , which like this newspaper is owned by Tribune Co., collected more than 30,000 toys for the giveaway.