The state branch of a nonprofit organization is seeking community volunteers to help knit, crochet or quilt baby blankets.
The California Chapter of Afghans for Angels provides remembrance blankets for parents who have lost a baby through miscarriage, stillbirth or sudden infant death syndrome. It distributes these special afghans to hospitals throughout California, including Huntington Hospital in Pasadena, Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles and White Memorial Medical Center in Los Angeles.
These blankets “are placed lovingly around these infant angels when they are held by their families for the brief time in which bittersweet hellos and sad good-byes are said,” according Afghans for Angels. The afghans are then given to the families to remember the child they lost and comfort them in their grief.
San Marino resident Cathy Ude has been volunteering for Afghans for Angels for approximately five years. She learned about the organization’s California Chapter through a Facebook post from its coordinator and her Claremont High School classmate Linda Meadows. Ude said she was interested in helping with the project and know people who like to knit. She collects the knitted blankets from people and sends them to Meadows in Sutter Creek once she gets a full box. She also reaches out to local hospitals to see if they’d be interested in receiving the afghans to give to parents.
“Many times parents who lose a baby have nothing to go home with,” Ude said. “This is so they have something that was around their baby to clutch and hold on to for the rest of their life.”
Nine months after Ude became involved with Afghans for Angels, family friend Susan Ross lost her baby and became a recipient of one of the blankets.
“My late daughter, Maryanne, was born in early 2011 following an emergency C-section at 35 weeks,” Ross said. “Within hours of losing her, a nurse came to my room at Huntington Hospital and presented me with a box containing a picture of Maryanne peacefully wrapped in a blanket, her birth certificate, a book on grieving the loss of a child, her hospital tags and hat, and at the bottom of the box was the colorful and soft blanket she had been photographed in. With no child to hold, the blanket instantly became a tangible memory as I grieved her loss, and I am so thankful it was shared with me to help stay close to my angel.”
Ross’s mother, Mary Gilbaugh, who also lives in San Marino, was introduced to Afghans for Angels through Ude when she learned about her daughter’s pregnancy not going well.
Gilbaugh said she saw how special the blanket was to her daughter.
“When I realized how important that was to her, I began knitting and crocheting for Afghans for Angels,” Gilbaugh said. “I use airport time, road trips, time watching sports on TV, sea days on cruises and any other opportunity I have to work on the blankets. Afghans for Angels gives me a way to honor my daughter and her late baby.”
Ross said she is so thankful for her “wonderful mom whose ability to knit is as strong as her willingness to give back.”
“Five years later, she still brings her knitting almost everywhere she goes,” she said. “And while she never meets the families who come to use her blankets, she loves knowing she’s possibly helping them grieve the way I was able to through her donations to Afghans For Angels.”
Meadows’ own experience with the loss of an infant led her to become involved with Afghans for Angels. Her daughter Stephanie Dawn Meadows died at 9 days old.
“She was born on Christmas Eve,” Meadows said. “They sent her home in a little stocking. I still have it to this day. She would have been 43 now.”
She said she’d never heard of Afghans for Angels until she saw it listed as a charity opportunity in a knitting magazine.
“It was something that I could do in my free time,” Meadows said.
She began the California Chapter in 2010 and it has grown tremendously throughout the years.
“It started with just myself and a friend because you have to start somewhere,” Meadows said. “Then, the word just gets out.”
She said she’s received thousands of afghans from people throughout the years and now supplies more than 25 hospitals, including a few outside of California, with afghans to give to parents.
“This is just to acknowledge the children and to acknowledge the couple as parents,” Meadows said. “Sometimes (the parents) don’t want to discuss it; nobody does. Sometimes they go home and it’s like they never were a parent. This gives them something that belonged to their child, something to keep.”
She said all patterns work and soft colors should be used. The “Angel afghans” should be 
24 inches square or smaller. The preferred size is 15 inches by 19 inches. Afghans for Angels also is in need of soft yarn in baby colors.
Anyone interested in creating the baby blankets or donating yarn should contact Ude at 626-233-4080 or cathyude@gmail.com.
