Petrolia couple goes above and beyond for Baby Bookworm project

Petrolia’s Derek and Jacquie Brown are special forces in the Literacy Lambton “sewing army.”

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Tracy Pound, executive director of the Sarnia-based charity providing literacy learning opportunities for Lambton County residents, also uses the term “infant-ry units” for volunteers and groups who handmake cloth bags for a project providing books and resources for families of babies born at Bluewater Health.

Each year, with the help of sponsors and volunteers, the Baby Bookworm project makes and fills bags for each of the 1,100 to 1,200 babies arriving at the Sarnia hospital.

And this year, the Browns made and delivered 1,250 bags on their own.

“I’m truly boggled,” Pound said about the couple’s output.

“They’re beautiful. . . . They’re pristine, pressed,” she said about the bags the Brown’s deliver to Literacy Lambton. “They figured out just the perfect handles that have just the perfect strength.”

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Derek Brown said they make about 100 bags a month.

“You just noodle down and do it,” he said.

The retired couple settled into a system where he cuts and sews bags and Jacquie attaches the handles.

He retired in 2017 as a senior executive in manufacturing, but still does some consulting. She makes handbags to sell at craft shows.

“It actually set out that he was helping me but now it’s more like I’m helping him,” Jacquie said.

“But she’s the professional,” he said.

They keep an eye out for deals on fabric and receive help with those costs from Literacy Lambton and others, including the Petrolia Lions Club he belongs to. Derek said donations of fabric through Literacy Lambton are always welcome.

Brown said he heard Tracy speak about Baby Bookworm, and his need for handmade cloth bags, at a Lions Club meeting after the couple moved to the town three years ago from Port Stanley.

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Derek said he was looking for something to do so he enlisted Jacquie, a lifelong seamstress, “and we went from there.”

“Sorry for the pun, but it’s such a labor of love that they’ve taken on,” Pound said.

Enlistment in the sewing army to open to all, she said. Literacy Lambton has a “spec sheet” volunteers can use to make bags other volunteers fill with two board books for families so they can begin reading to infants right away.

“Many of us have warm and fuzzy memories of bedtime stories,” plus “there are benefits to reading to infants right from birth,” including creating a strong foundation for language development, Pound said.

Each bag also includes a keepsake reading log with information about the Lambton County Library, as well as other local resources and programs for new parents, Pound said.

“Those are really important for connections that new parents need to make, to feel a sense of community,” she said.

The Baby Bookworm project launched about three years ago following discussions with the hospital’s maternal infant child department, which is also where the idea came from to use cloth bags made by community volunteers.

“It’s really special when you think that someone else cares enough to welcome your family” with something they’ve done, Pound said.

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