When Jessica Best was a teenager, she had a life-changing experience when visiting her brother at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh.

Her brother was in the intensive care unit. Best, 29, of Butler Township remembers a girl who was in a neighboring bed who had cancer.

“In the 13 days that he was in the ICU, she didn't have one visitor,” she said. “She was very quiet, very polite and she didn't smile at all.”

One thing brought a smile to the girl's face, though. On Christmas Eve, a man dressed as Santa Claus visited the unit and gave each patient their own sack filled with toys.

“That day, she smiled all day,” Best said. “It was really cool.”

That girl made a lasting impression on Best, so much so that Best now operates Mission Make a Child Smile (M.A.C.S.), which raises money to buy toys for patients of Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh.

Some people donate toys, and some donate money. Best starts collecting at the beginning of November and goes through the second week of December.

Best collects money from people she knows, and this year she also collected from a GoFundMe page.

She began Mission M.A.C.S. in 2014, collecting $800 the first year, $1,800 in 2015 and nearly $2,000 this year.

“Last year what I did, I nagged everybody to help me out,” Best said. “This year, I didn't feel like nagging as much so I didn't, but people have still met and exceeded (the total from) last year, so they have come to find me.”

With the $2,000, and the toys donated, the value of the toys brought to the hospital this year was around $3,500.

The toys range from coloring books to skateboards to iPods.

“Literally just anything,” Best said.

All of the money is donated on good faith, and Best posted pictures of receipts and the toys on Facebook to show that the money went to a good cause.

Best, her mother, Lynne Best, and her boyfriend, Kory Nowakowski, brought the toys to the hospital on Saturday.

Though they didn't deal with the children directly — the toys were checked by the hospital's child life department to make sure they were new and acceptable — Best has received positive feedback for her work.

“(The hospital) is just amazed with the amount of things we can take down from the generosity of things that we get here,” she said.