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SALT LAKE CITY — Five-year-old J.J. Sallee listened carefully as Pastor Joe Vazquez of the Salt Lake City Mission described the attractions for children at Saturday's birthday party at Pioneer Park for people experiencing homelessness.
"Balloons and face-painting for you guys, and cake," Vazquez explained to J.J. and his sisters, Alissa, 9 1/2, and Kylee, 7. J.J. stayed quiet until he finished, then began jumping up and down.
"Cake!" he squealed.
Chris and Davida Sallee had brought their children from the family shelter in Midvale hours before the midday start of the party, a new version of the ministry's 23-year-old tradition of feeding and entertaining those in need on Labor Day.
"They wanted to play. They get stir crazy," Davida Sallee said. Usually the family spends days when the children aren't in school walking around downtown trying to get to know their new surroundings after arriving recently from Montana.
"We take them to the fountains. To see big buildings. Just around the city," Davida Sallee said. Sipping coffee set out by the mission, she noted the downtown park still filled with a number of sleeping people was more welcoming than usual.
By noon, hundreds of people had gathered for hot dogs, nachos, cereal, baked beans and other food as Christian music played and Vazquez and others from the non-denominational mission spoke about faith.
"We're just out here because nobody else is going to be on the holiday," Vasquez said. The Labor Day event became a party to celebrate the birthdays of all of the participants when he arrived from the Colorado Springs mission two years ago.
He said that unfortunately includes more and more children, since families make up the fastest-growing portion of the homeless population. As he spoke, children with brighly painted faces scampered nearby.
Paster Wayne Wilson said singing "Happy Birthday" and passing out slices of cake in a festive setting is a way to help people with no place to call home feel a part of the community.
"They all have birthdays. They're already feeling pretty rejected," Wilson said. "So we pick a day and celebrate."
For Ruby Miera and her cousin, Brenda Neria, the party was an opportunity to relax on a grassy spot in the park on a sunny day. Both women grew up in New Mexico and said they'd had jobs for years until illnesses left them unable to work.
"It takes our minds off our real lives. We're talking about old times, nice times, instead of complaining," Neria said as she adjusted the laces on a pair of boots after changing into clean clothes. "We don't get to talk like this on the streets."
Miera said her birthday is usually a sad day because it also marks the day her brother was buried. But she said she appreciated the efforts by the mission to mark the occasion.
"It's nice. They're nice people. They came out to feed us. They're good people," she said, seated beside bags of clothes and toiletries handed out at the event. "These people don't have to do this. They care about us."
John Tyler, who came to Utah from West Virginia, waited patiently in a long line for food that still stretched nearly halfway through the park even though many people were already eating.
"It's always nice to have something like this," he said. But Tyler, who plans to leave for Florida as soon as he straightens out a Social Security issue, wasn't interested in celebrating his birthday. "I don't look forward to those anymore."
