It’s in the bag … How the Read to Me! bag is packed and distributed

Pat Othen places hubs into the booklet to hold the lullaby and nursery rhyme CD

In our last newsletter we told you about the sewing and printing process each Read to Me! bag goes through. Now the story of the bag continues with how we pack and distribute the bag and how it reaches all eleven hospitals in Nova Scotia that offer maternity services.

The Read to Me! provincial office is located on the Family Newborn Unit at the IWK Health Centre. Amazingly, our little office is our work space, warehouse and assembly room. Over 100,000 individual items such as books, CDs and DVDs come and go through our doors each year. People are often amazed to hear that we have more books on hand than many bookstores!

Our two-room office is a hub of activity twice a week when our volunteers come to pack bags for the program. About 9000 babies are born in Nova Scotia yearly. Half of these babies are born at the IWK Health Centre while the other half are born at the ten hospitals that offer maternity services around the province. Our bag packing volunteers work in two groups. Husband and wife Bryce and Hazel Gibson pack over 4500 bags a year for the IWK, while Pat Othen packs about 4200 for the rest of the province.

Hazel and Bryce Gibson pack
Read to Me! bags

Over the period of a week, the Read to Me! storage cupboard, which stores enough Read to Me! bags for seven days, empties as bags are given out to families.

On average, about 90 babies are born at the IWK each week and our bag packing volunteers Bryce and Hazel come to the rescue by packing a new supply for the Read to Me! cupboard once a week.

Shanda lays out stacks of bag components on our special table that rises and lowers at the touch of a button. Bryce and Hazel then fill each bright yellow canvas bag with two baby books, a resource booklet of information, a CD of lullabies and nursery rhymes, a library brochure, the Read to Me! DVD and bookstore coupons. It’s quite amazing to see how quickly Bryce and Hazel fill up the large cupboard each week with packed bags, and even more amazing to see how quickly it empties during the week as new babies are born!