Special gifts await NHRMC’s Christmas babies

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) –- Christmas babies at New Hanover Regional Medical Center will look extra festive as they leave the hospital this holiday season.

Starting Christmas Eve, each baby will receive a knitted Christmas cap and stocking to go home in.

A group of women with the Gifted Retired Active Dedicated Seniors program at the New Hanover County Senior Center have been working to create these gifts for the newborns since September.

“We want to give back. We want to make sure all these little babies have something warm. That makes us feel good,” said Jeanie Cheek.

Eileen McConville, Director of Volunteers and Auxiliary Services at the hospital said the group knits, crochets, and sews hats, blankets and other goods for the estimated 4,000 babies born each year at New Hanover.

According to McConville, 12-15 babies are born a day this time of year, so the Christmas caps and stockings the women with GRAD made will last about a week.

“It is so special to our patients and their families to have a newborn baby, and to have a hand crocheted cap for the baby made for someone that doesn’t even know you but cared enough to give their time,” said McConville. “They love to get to choose their cap.”

As the women of GRAD met Monday morning, they were thankful for this opportunity.

“I look back at my life and I think of all of the things that I’ve been through and all of the blessings I have. Christmas time is a time to say ‘Thank you,’” said Cheek.

Funding for the materials comes from the New Hanover Regional Medical Center Auxiliary.