Rascal Flatts stopped by the Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt this week — an annual holiday tradition of spreading cheer to child patients and their families.

Accompanied by the Today show, the trio docked in the hospital’s surgery wing (their eponymous Rascal Flatts Surgery Center) to read T'Was the Night Before Christmas, compete in a good-natured gingerbread house-making contest and pose for pictures with patients.

"It's such a magical place," bassist Jay DeMarcus tells Today in a televised part of their Christmas visit. "They've become really more like family now than anything else, because we've been partnering with them for so many years. It's one of the things that we do that I'm most proud of."

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Along with emphasizing Nashville's role in the hitmaking band's success, DeMarcus gave credit to the hospital for their part in the decade-old partnership. In total, the band has raised more than $3 million dollars for the pediatric facility.

"If God's blessed you with a platform to be able to make a living doing something you love to do," vocalist Gary Levox explains, "well, not just the right thing, but the only thing to do is give back and bless somebody else."

Download the band’s live reading of T'Was the Night Before Christmas here.

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