Baby blanket follows a family tradition

Today is the day Molly James Mohr was supposed to be born. July 26 was her mother’s due date. It had been circled on the calendar for months.

But she decided to check in 17 days early. Her parents, Brian and Hannah Leigh Mohr, welcomed Molly James to the world on July 9.

She weighed 6 pounds, 15 ounces. She was a couple of eyelashes short of 20 inches.

In the long line of love she now is a part of, 19 perhaps is the most special number of all.

Molly James —one of those good, Southern double names — is the 19th baby to come home from the hospital with a blanket her great-great grandfather made in the summer of 1979.

Yes, that’s right. Her grandfather — not grandmother — made the white afghan that has become a family tradition.

(Isn’t it nice to see the number 19 without the word “COVID” in front of it?)

Pat Patterson was a kind, caring and larger-than-life man, who walked softly and carried a big coffee cup. He worked as a meat cutter at the S&S Cafeteria when it was located downtown on Cherry Street.

He and his wife, Doris, lived on Virginia Avenue and later opened a small grocery, Pat’s Food Store, on Oglethorpe Street in what is now The Bear’s Den restaurant. He loved to bake cakes and had a reputation for taking home blue ribbons in the men’s cook-offs at Tabernacle Baptist Church.

He was proud of his oldest grandchild, Kathy Collins Baugh, and even more excited when Kathy was expecting her first child — the first of his great grandchildren.

Pat and Doris owned a wooden loom. They mostly used it to make placemats for family and friends. Although he never had made a blanket, Pat was determined Kathy’s baby was going to come home from the hospital wrapped in style. (Providing warmth was not much of a concern at the tail end of the dog days of summer.)

He was convinced Kathy was having a baby girl, so he included some pink in the package he sent her. But Brent Collins would become the firstborn of Kathy’s three sons.

Brent, who will be 41 next month and is a senior vice president at Cadence Bank in Macon, was the first stitch in a tradition that has included brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews and cousins across the generations.

The weather was a little more blanket-friendly when Brent’s brother, Chandler, was born in November 1982. Pat and Doris kept 3-year-old Brent at Kathy’s house while she was at the hospital.

“My grandfather had hunted all over the house for that blanket,’’ Kathy said. “When I came home, I had it around Chandler. My grandfather was delighted. Our babies have been coming home with it ever since.’’

As a youngster, Brent shared a special relationship with his grandfather. Pat would take him along when he visited with friends, and they often stopped at Krispy Kreme for a doughnut and a chocolate milk on the way home.

Tyler Collins, the youngest of Kathy’s three sons, was born 36 years ago today. He never knew his grandfather, who died 10 days before he was born.

Tyler now lives in Charleston, South Carolina, where he works as a horticulturist. His daughter, Macon Lilly Collins, was born six weeks ago. Kathy brought the blanket back to Macon for the birth of Molly James. The babies’ due dates were so close together family members wondered if a blanket exchange somewhere along I-16 might be necessary.

Kathy’s sister, Pam Meharg, has no trouble remembering Veteran’s Day in 1991. She was in the delivery room giving birth to her daughter, Haley, who came home with the same blanket that accompanied her daughter, Sullivyn, on April 23, 2018. Two more grandchildren are on the way in November and January.

“I remember my grandfather setting the loom, making the blanket and giving it to my sister,’’ Pam said. “I don’t think he thought about all the great grandchildren and great-great grandchildren who would be using it. It has turned into a special tradition in our family.’’

Mitzi Heath is the grandmother of Molly James Mohr. She remembers the flood of emotions when her newborn daughter, Hannah Leigh, was accompanied by the blanket when she came home from the hospital at the beginning of the Cherry Blossom Festival in 1989.

“Hannah Leigh never knew granddaddy, and she was 3 months old when my grandmother died,’’ Mitzi said. “I was fortunate my grandparents were such a big part of my life. And this is a way that keeps their memory alive.’’

Kathy is the “keeper of the blanket.” She stores it in a special box, protected with tissue paper. She places it in the hands of every family member who has an appointment with the stork. The tradition carries the same reverence as a baptismal gown passed down through the generations.

For Kathy, it brings back her grandfather.

“It is special because he made it with love,’’ she said. “I think he smiles down from heaven every time we use that blanket.’’

Ed Grisamore teaches journalism at Stratford Academy in Macon. His column appears on Sundays in The Telegraph.