A doting dad-of-three does the school run dressed in wacky Christmas-themed costumes every day - for a heartbreaking reason.<br /><br />Niall O’Connor, 43, has dressed up as the Grinch, a turkey, a penguin, an elf and Santa to drop his two daughters off at primary school and his three-year-old son at nursery.<br /><br />The dad-of-three decided to spread festive cheer and raise money for charity in honour of his wife Kirsty who died last March.<br /><br />The 41-year-old suffered a cardiac arrest in front of Niall while they were at a wedding in Ireland.<br /><br />Devastated Niall, from Wolverhampton, West Mids., gave up his job as a chef to look after the couple's children Robyn, six, Darcie, five and Sonny, three.<br /><br />This Christmas he decided to bring smiles to the faces of children and parents by dressing up in a different costume every day in December. <br /><br />His costume antics have seen him dress up as numerous hit characters and he’s even got other parents in on the act too.<br /><br />Niall said: “I lost Kirsty 21 months ago. She unfortunately had a heart attack and died. The kids came first. <br /><br />“I decided at Christmas I wanted to cheer everyone up and myself if you like. I started wearing a costume every day last year. I started wearing 12 or 13 costumes. <br /><br />“This year all the teachers and the parents were dressed up on the first day. I came in a big grinch costume. All the costumes will be at the school. <br /><br />“The last day we’ll improve the costumes a bit and I'm sure we’ll get some smiles.<br /><br />"I get a lot of positive messages from people and that’s the main aim here, make people smile. <br /><br />"That’s basically what it’s all about, putting smiles on people's faces. The responses have been great.<br /><br />“Even after the death of my wife the support has been fabulous. Without the school it wouldn’t be possible. <br /><br />“It will finish on the 21st and it started on the sixth. I just picked the costumes up online, last year I picked them up. I had some that I picked up as I lived abroad. <br /><br />"I had some from Santa runs where I have done some running. The Grinch is the favourite, that created a lot of laughs. They’re all funny in their own ways. <br /><br />"Everybody ,the community as a whole, has been great. The traffic lady was great, people beep their horns. <br /><br />"I walk up to meet their kids. It’s only a ten minute walk but some of them can be quite restricting."<br /><br />Niall is dressing up to raise money for the Heart Foundation after Kirsty died as a result of a cardiac arrest and he’s raised £500 so far. <br /><br />He added: “We were attending a wedding in Ireland and Kirsty had a heart attack that night. <br /><br />"We’d had a beautiful day, we’d had a lovely day. There was no underlying warning. It was her first time away from the kids which was sad. <br /><br />“It cheers me up to see people happy. I like to cheer people up with their mental health, if it cheers me up it cheers someone else up. If <br /><br />“On the GoFundMe it’s about £500, then we raised money around the school. I was dressed up as Mrs Clause that day. <br /><br />“I’m hoping to have all the parents and teachers dressed up and I'll be Santa, I sprayed my beard white last night. <br /><br />“I’ll do this every year until i can get away with it, until my kids stop me. This is about my wife. <br /><br />"I want people to remember her. Christmas is a hard time, if we can cheer people up.”
