Girl raises money for children's Christmas gifts

ST. PETERSBURG (FOX 13) - A little girl is using her ingenuity to help her peers. 

11-year-old Michelina Damianakis and her friends are arriving in style to deliver Christmas presents to patients at Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital in St. Pete.

Michelina raised more than $2,000 to buy toys for the children in the hospital.  

"I think this makes my heart grow bigger and it makes my smile grow bigger," Michelina said.

She raised the money by selling designer flip-flops. She calls them Love Floppies.

Michelina thought of the idea when a nurse gave her a doll when she was in the hospital.

Members from the Watermark Senior Community donated five hundred dollars to the cause to help Michelina reach her goal of $2,000.

"We want to be a help to someone you know," George Pietro Gallo a Watermark resident said. "We thought this would be a good place to help."

A small sized Santa impacting the lives of her peers.