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Holiday World hosts 27th Play Day for children with disabilities

SANTA CLAUS, Ind. (WEHT) — Holiday World & Splashin’ Safari hosted its 27th Annual Play Day. 

Holiday World has designates the special day for children with special needs, their teachers and caretakers.

“This is actually one of the best days out of the entire year. The smiles you will not see bigger smiles than you do today seriously it is the most fun,” said Holiday World owner Lauren Crosby.

More than 3,000 people from schools took part. 

Theme park officials say they were prepared just for this day. 

Crosby said, “Our employees are just trained to take a little bit of extra time whenever getting people on and off the rides.” 

Teacher and attendee Kyle Hall said, “It’s been great. We are having a blast out here. Lines are short. and it’s an atmosphere of love and kindness. We are so grateful for the inclusion day.”

Hall added, “It’s really wonderful for the children to have a day where they can just be a kid. You know some of these kids have big challenges every day and to be able to just come have fun with their classmates and their teachers take their time do the day their way and just enjoy it it’s amazing and we can’t thank Holiday World enough.”

Although Holiday World says there are no major changes from previous play days, this year the park hit a major milestone. 

“The biggest thing I would say for this year is that our donation to Easter Seals has reached over a half-a-million dollars this year, and so we’re very excited were pretty proud of that,” Crosby said. 

That $500,000 is what Holiday World has donated to date. 

It was made possible by a $30,000 donation this year.