Tuesday, July 18, 2000

Woman still helps others put blankets over those birthday blues

Elizabeth Valdez will forever remember the birthday she celebrated earlier this year.
   Not because this was the year the big 4-0 crept up on her, leaving her in no mood for cake and balloons.
   Rather, she will remember it fondly because that was the day she received in the mail a crocheted bookmark in the shape of a cross.
   "I had been feeling real down about 40," said Valdez, recalling how the birthday blues lifted when she got home at the end of the day and found in her stack of mail a homemade greeting card enclosed with the hand-stitched gift.
   "She remembered," Valdez whispered as she tore open the envelope, amazed that the baby-blanket lady had found the time to remember her birthday.
   The gift-giver was none other than Sandra Ramsey, a fellow member of Gardendale Baptist Church, who has been stitching baby blankets and giving them to mothers- and grandmothers-to-be ever since her best friend taught her how to knit in the 1960s while they were living in France.
   "I have no idea how many I've given away," said Ramsey, 58. "Some months I give away 10. Some months I give away one. I don't think I own anything I've knitted or crocheted myself."
   Eight years ago, Ramsey eagerly took on her church's Sunday-school birthday list, remembering everyone's special day with a greeting card and handmade bookmark. Ramsey, however, didn't stop with the munchkins.
   Adults also need to know someone cares, Ramsey explained, adding the names of her church singles group members to her list of recipients.
   It only seemed natural for a woman who often stays up past midnight making the shawls, baby blankets and lap throws that for decades she has bestowed upon family, friends, acquaintances and even strangers.
   All that despite having lupus, an auto-immune disease, scleroderma, a hardening of the connective tissues, and Raynaud's disease, a vascular disorder that limits her mobility and lands her in the hospital at times.
   "Instead of bringing flowers, friends bring me yarn," Ramsey said. "Even though I'm in the hospital, friends know I want to make sure people are remembered on their special day."
   Living on a fixed income doesn't seem to faze Ramsey either.
   "God provides the thread," Ramsey said. "I'm just blessed by it.
   "I've been able to place my blankets around newborns. I've seen them come home in my blanket. And I've seen parents come to church with their babies wrapped in my blankets.
   "That's all the thanks I need, knowing that parents think enough of me to choose my blanket to take their little ones to church in."
  
  
 

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