Newborn tradition at Beaufort Memorial more than 30 years old
By Cindy Whitman
Special to The Island News
A baby is a gift any time of year, but come December at the Beaufort Memorial Collins Birthing Center, it’s all about the wrapping. Each new December arrival is delivered to mom and dad in a cozy, handmade and embroidered flannel holiday stocking.
Inaugurated more than 30 years ago by the Beaufort Memorial Hospital Auxiliary, this now time-honored holiday tradition was a hit from Day 1, according to retired Collins Birthing Center Director Patti Valentini.
“Our volunteers came up with the idea and brought us a big box of stockings,” she recalls fondly. “There were about 100 the first year. Before we took the babies to see mom and dad for the first time, we tucked them in like little stocking stuffers. The parents loved it and the birthing center staff loved being a part of it!”
Jonolyn Ferreri seconds that sentiment. Her son, Jamie, now 28, was wheeled into her hospital room in a red and white flannel stocking on Dec. 7, 1995.
“My husband, John, and I didn’t know Beaufort Memorial did that, so it was a really sweet surprise,” Jonolyn remembers. “And my mother was especially touched. She told the story every year at Christmas. That’s a special memory for me now. I think about her and how much she loved telling that story.”
As the years rolled by, thousands of December babies were tucked into holiday stockings and delivered to their delighted parents and families, and then some changes within the volunteer programs prompted the stocking stuffer deliveries to be put on pause.
However, thanks to the excitement and enthusiasm of Labor and Delivery Nurse, Amy Geier the tradition was rekindled in 2016.
“I just remembered it was such a fun tradition,” Amy says. “We were all like, ‘Aw, we kind of miss those stockings.’ They were just so cute, and the babies looked so cute in them, and the looks on their parents’ faces when they saw them were priceless!”
Amy called her mom in Seattle, who likes to sew in her spare time, and asked if she would make the holiday stockings for the Beaufort Memorial babies that year.
“I sent her a picture of one, she created a pattern, and she and some of her sewing group friends made 50 that first year,” Amy recalled.
Amy’s mom and sewing group friends supplied the Beaufort Memorial stockings for the next two years, but the intensive labor and high costs of materials and shipping caused the Seattle sewing crew to decide it was time to pass the baton.
Enter the Sea Island Quilters Guild
“We had been making holiday baby quilts for Beaufort Memorial for years,” Sea Island Quilters Guild Outreach Committee Chair Brenda Lucas said. “One day, one of our members was delivering quilts to the birthing center and was asked if making the baby stockings might be something our guild would be interested in doing. We offered to have members quilt them at first, but the hospital preferred for all the stockings to be the same. The Sea Island Quilters enlisted the help of The Material Girls quilting group — 90% of whom are also guild members — to sponsor the stocking project and together we got to work!”
That was five years ago.
The collaboration is now an annual event that begins in August with pattern cutting and culminates in October when the quilters assemble the 100 to 110 stockings.
“We don’t charge for our labor, only the costs of the materials,” Brenda explains. “It’s a joyous process. We look forward to it every year.”
As part of the stocking process, the cuffs are embroidered with the message “Happy Holidays” with the help of Anita Bryde, embroidery artist and owner of Polawana Puppy.
Bryde, a retired Atlanta realtor who is also a member of The Material Girls and Sea Island Quilters Guild, took up embroidery after arriving on Lady’s Island with her husband in 2018. She fell in love with the art and soon traded traditional needle and thread for a $7,000 embroidery machine, which she put to use to start her own embroidery business.
“When they first were making the stockings, they sent them to a screen printer to have “Merry Christmas” printed on the stocking cuffs. They were cute, but we thought we could make them look a little better,” Bryde remembered. “So, I volunteered myself and my embroidery machine.”
It takes Anita’s machine about 23 minutes to embroider each stocking cuff. Multiply that by 100-plus stockings, and that’s quite the labor of love, even if she isn’t wielding the needle and thread herself.
Bryde thinks about the math and laughs. “I guess it is. But it’s fun, I enjoy it. And I enjoy hearing all the stories of how much the new parents love the stockings and seeing their babies in them. When you’re an artist, you like it when people like what you do.”
Special memories
When it comes to the sight of the Beaufort Memorial babies in their holiday stockings, the word “like” is an understatement.
Jaye Harris, a preoperative assessment testing nurse at Beaufort Memorial, says “love” is more like it. Her son, Max, was born at the Collins Birthing Center on Dec. 16, 2020.
“At the time, I worked in the ER and didn’t know anything about labor and delivery. I had a Cesarean section and only saw Max for a minute before they had to finish my surgery,” she says.
“The first time I got a good look at my son was when they wheeled him into my room in his Christmas stocking. It was such an anxious time for me; it was during the pandemic, it was my first baby, and the sight of him all snug and cozy in his stocking was the best Christmas gift ever.”
When it comes to capturing these best-ever holiday moments, photographer Charlotte Berkeley is often right there. The Beaufort native specializes in newborn, family and maternity photography, but she has her own Beaufort Memorial stocking stuffer experience.
Charlotte was actually at the hospital on Dec. 20, 2019, when she went into labor with her son.
“I came in to do photos for another family, and at 10 a.m. my water broke,” Berkeley laughs. “I was like, ‘Oops!’ I had seen lots of babies in their stockings, but it was still a very special moment for me when they wheeled Berk into my room.”
Thirty years. Thirty Decembers. Thousands of babies. Enough red flannel to blanket a football field. Miles of silky embroidery thread. Hundreds of volunteers over the years. The Beaufort Memorial Collins Birthing Center holiday stocking story is a tale filled with tradition, volunteerism, altruism and sheer joy. And each new baby born is still a gift.
