June 3, 2004

Quilts for preemies—A gift of love

By Lisa Marie Gonzales, Ed.D.
Special to the Times

It began as a simple article in a local newspaper, calling for donations for the Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford. But at Los Alamitos Elementary, the simple written request became a semester-long service learning project for students in Carol Sheridan’s second through fourth grade class.

Sheridan, a teacher and former Los Alamitos parent, learned about the “Blankets for Babies” program and further researched it on the Internet.

“I thought it would be a great way for our students to give back to the community,” said Sheridan. She shared her thoughts with colleague Kelly Gammel, who “couldn’t wait to do something special for such little babies.”

Both contacted Kate Teague, a neo-natal intensive care unit (NICU) nurse at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford, who began the program about five years ago. The program started when nurses in the NICU, sensitive to the needs of parents of premature newborns, noticed that the parents were often distracted by the mechanical and sterile setting of the preemie area. “We wanted to have parents feel comfortable with seeing their very tiny infants, and putting the babies on colorful quilts seemed to be the perfect solution,” Teague shared. A brightly colored quilt helps a parent focus on the baby beneath it or next to it, and not to all the medical attachments, IVs, and tubes.

The quilt project then became a long-term lesson in planning for Sheridan’s students, and the enlistment of help by family and friends. It began with a lesson about the history of quilts, presented by Gammel’s mother Nancy McWhorter. She explained to the students that hundreds of years ago, quilts were lined with paper and raw cloth. “In more recent decades, people just recycled old clothing and put the reusable pieces into their handmade quilts,” she told the students.

The children even read books about quilts, including the book by singer and actress Dolly Parton, “Coat of Many Colors.” And their interest and curiosity was piqued.

The next step required extensive math planning and instruction on the part of Sheridan and Gammel. They had students count up and sketch different patterns that could be made in a 36x36 square. The students planned with their newly sketched and colored patterns on paper, selected pre-washed and cut fabric pieces that blended with the colors in other fabrics, and began to pin them together.

“Mine was three different prints: blue, multi-colors, and pink in an interchangeable pattern, and the blue had moons and stars on it,” commented fourth grader Marina Robinson.

Second grader Kayla Gregory shared, “my quilt was dark blue with small fruits, and the other squares had pink and white stripes on them. It was really easy to make the pattern but hard to do the stitching.”

“Putting the fabrics together was my favorite part. I was really good at that,” said fourth grader Steven Raimondi. His quilt combined brown leaves and flowers of “different colors of the rainbow.”

Added their teacher Carol Sheridan, “They did the stitching by hand, and if it wasn’t perfect, they had to rip out the stitches and do it again…and again…and for some, yet again. But they all got it!”

“It was hard to stitch them together, but I got better at it. I think I’m ready to start planning for next year,” shared fourth grader Brett Varni.

The project culminated in last week’s trip to Stanford to deliver the quilts to the NICU at the Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital. Little did the children and their teachers know that this trip would not be a quick quilt dropoff, but a 90-minute-long tour of the NICU. Sheridan’s students, teachers, and parent chaperones went into the NICU nursery and saw the quilts made by children at other schools and where their quilts would soon be placed. Each premature baby had a handmade quilt beneath him or hanging from the side of each child’s isolette.

“It was amazing to see how many quilts were already there. Each little miracle baby had a special quilt made by a student somewhere. It was very touching,” said Sheridan.

Varni commented, “It was so cool to see babies in an incubator and stand right next to them. One turned his head, opened his eyes, and looked at me. He was the size of a Coke can and I’ve never seen a baby that small. I put my heart and soul into this project; it was more than just delivering a box of quilts.”

Fourth grader Sarah Meyer said, “I felt like I was doing a really good thing because I was helping babies in the hospital. It was fun to deliver our quilts to them.”

“The babies were so small. I couldn’t believe how small their diapers were,” said fourth grader Jessica Vogel. Vogel couldn’t wait to get home to show her mother and other classmates the unused diaper. She brought it back to share with others and explain how small premature babies really are.

“I am thrilled that my son participated in the ‘Blankets for Babies’ project,” shared parent Brandy Varni. “Each child had to come up with a theme, make patterns using their math skills, and to complete a finished project. Most of all, the field trip to the hospital and the chance to stand right next to the babies—it was a spectacular learning experience.”

Sheridan also realized that what started out as a small-scale service learning project with a lot of math and planning really took on a life of its own. She added, “Spending 90 minutes next to babies in a preemie unit like we visited may have been enough to spark the interest in a student to go into medicine and become a pediatrician.”

Dr. Lisa Gonzales is the principal at Los Alamitos Elementary School.