Christmas just got a little merrier for hundreds of children in Beaufort County.

Toy donations came pouring in on Thursday, as members of the Washington (noon) Rotary Club picked up Toys for Tots donations from across the county.

According to Toys for Tots coordinator Frank Etheridge, a Rotary member and CresCom Bank senior vice president and market executive for Beaufort County, this year’s turnout went beyond his expectations.

“So far, it’s been an excellent turnout. We have plenty of toys, so hopefully we’ll have a lot of happy kids on Christmas morning,” Etheridge said. “I really didn’t know what to expect, but there were some locations where I had to make three truck loads. … Basically, the support from Beaufort County was very overwhelming, from the local businesses to social clubs to service clubs. They all took it upon themselves to help out, to assist with toy collection.”

Where there weren’t enough official Toys for Tots boxes to go around, some businesses created and decorated their own and employees of Vidant Beaufort Hospital have amped up their collecting with a challenge between departments as to which one collects the most toys to donate—winner gets the Toys for Tots trophy for the year, according to Etheridge.

Toys for Tots, a U.S. Marine Corps Auxiliary program in its sixth decade, provides Christmas toys to families that might not be able to afford such luxuries during the holidays. This year, 459 Beaufort County children are signed up to receive gifts, Etheridge said. Each child is added to the list after an application process through Beaufort-Hyde Partnership for Children. Washington (noon) Rotary handles the collection part of the program and St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Washington becomes the repository for the toys, as members of the congregation and other volunteers sort the toys into age- and gender-appropriate categories.

“Those are the three organizations that deal with the logistics of it, but it’s the community that really supports it,” Etheridge said.

Distribution of the gifts takes place Sunday from 11 a.m. until 6 p.m.