Darien Girl Scouts Participate in TTMF Blank-a-Thon

The Tiny Miracles Foundation is a local Darien nonprofit dedicated to helping and supporting the parents of premature babies in and around Fairfield County, Connecticut. They provide hundreds of keepsake isolette blankets to the families of premature babies in the NICU (neonatal intensive care unit) every year. These blankets are a positive and comforting gesture to parents dealing with the shock of a premature birth. In addition, the blankets also improve infant development through a variety of factors, including enhancing preemies’ neurological development by protecting them from excess light and noise in the NICU.

The event took place at St. John Church and was hosted as a project by Girl Scout Troop 50535, a group of high school freshmen. One of the troop’s members, Claire Borecki, started to plan the event several months in advance after deciding she wanted to hold an event to teach younger girl scouts about community service. She partnered with Kelly Chapman of the Tiny Miracles Foundation, who supported and provided the fleece for the event, and then recruited the members of her troop, who spent countless hours helping to prepare the blankets. The Blank-a-Thon also would not have been successful without the mentorship of Sueann Schorr, a leader of Troop 50535.

When the Blank-a-Thon started, about thirty-five elementary school girls scouts bounded into the event, eager to work. They played a name game to get to know each other and then learned about preemies before splitting into groups to make the blankets. The work wasn’t easy, but they were troopers, and got through all forty blankets in less than two hours, with everyone earning tootsie pops as prizes at the end for their efforts. The true meaning of the event was not lost on the young attendees; first grader Marianne summed it up, “It isn’t about the prizes. It’s helping people that matters.”