(St. Joseph, Mo.)  The faces told it all.  For many kids Christmas came early and in the form of a shoe.

"It's a great day," said eight year old Ayanna Piercy.

She and her brother Octavious were fitted for shoes. To them it was exciting to hold their own shoe box, but for mom, it was much more.

"You got a lot of people here who can't afford new shoes or they're really trying and stressing about getting their kids shoes, so I think this is good," said Agrie Piercy.

Piercy along with hundreds of other families stood in line for hours to take advantage of the "Soles for Christ" shoe program.
For Rachel wise, a new pair of shoes is helping her family in hard times.

"Right now, my husband works in construction, so he gets laid off every now and then and so it just helps with putting extra money towards bills and things like that," Wise said.

What started six years ago as a vision and just barely two hundred shoes has turned into this year's donations with more than seven hundred new shoes.

"I'm an educator so I know how important that first day of school is when you come in and have that new pair of shoes, so that's kind of why the program was started," said volunteer Connie Newton.

But, even with six tables full of shoes, Newton says there's always that fear some kids wont get a pair of shoes.

"Hopefully we have a size that the children need, if not then we try to get that.  We have other people that are still willing to buy shoes," she says.

The AFL-CIO will distribute the remainder of the shoes Tuesday starting at 9am.  Parents must have their kids with them as well as the child's social security card.