Please guide our hands in making items for these precious babies. Help them to know the love we have for them by the warmth of the clothing we have made for their use. Protect their tiny bodies against disease and harm. Let their loving parents be able to watch them grow to be strong and healthy ...

-- A prayer composed by Jan Shaffer, founder of God's Precious Preemies Ministry, and recited at the opening of each meeting of the group at St. Ferdinand Church in Cranberry

Sue Tobolski, of New Sewickley, hasn't crocheted since eighth grade, yet the 49-year-old is among a dozen or more women with balls of pastel yarn in their laps. A strip of what will be a doll-size blue blanket is coming off the hook she's holding.

Not too long ago, her friend suffered a stillbirth, Ms. Tobolski said. Of great comfort was a handmade "preemie" outfit for the tiny boy that the hospital had given to her friend. "I remember that so clearly. It meant the world to her,'' Ms. Tobolski said as she fingered the baby-blue yarn.

That memory morphed into a call to action when she learned in June of a new group forming in Cranberry: Its mission would be to create handmade items for premature babies.

"I knew this was something I wanted to try,'' Ms. Tobolski said.

She's among about 100 women who have pulled out their knitting needles, crochet hooks and sewing machines to make sweaters and hats, booties and mittens, blankets and snuggle-tubes for the dozens of premature babies being cared for on any given day in the neonatal intensive care units of Pittsburgh's largest hospitals.

Based at St. Ferdinand Church but extending into the community at large, they call themselves God's Precious Preemies Ministry. Since June, they've produced at least 700 items of handmade clothing and accessories.

"We are so grateful,'' said Megan Leese, of White, Beaver County. She is a board member and committee chairwoman for the year-old Pittsburgh-based Parent Resource Network that supports parents of premature children.

Mrs. Leese gave birth to a premature daughter, Julia Elizabeth, on July 13, 2006, at West Penn Hospital. Born at 26-weeks gestation -- full term is 37 to 42 weeks -- the baby died when she was 21 days old. A few months later, a West Penn employee told her that an effort was under way to create a support group for parents of preemies. That effort evolved into the Parent Resource Network.

Among Mrs. Leese's first missions was to seek assistance for the network's Helping Hands committee. The initial purpose of Helping Hands was to recruit volunteers to make quilts and blankets for preemies.

"I had been given a quilt for Julia when she was in the hospital. I was able to bring it home with me and that's all I have left of my daughter, other than memories and pictures," Mrs. Leese said.

She made 80 quilts in the months after her baby died and donated them to West Penn. Now, as Helping Hands Committee chairwoman, she's enlisting others to do something similar for partner hospitals with the Parent Resource Network. Those partners include West Penn, Allegheny General, Magee-Womens, Children's, Mercy, the Transitional Infant Care facility at The Children's Home of Pittsburgh, and the Lemieux Family Center in Pittsburgh.

Mrs. Leese is asking people to put their hands to work to make baby items for infants who spend their days and nights in hospital isolettes.

The idea is as practical as it is personal.

"When these little ones come out of their temperature-controlled isolettes so they can be held by their moms and dads, they need blankets, little hats, something to keep their bodies warm. They're too little to maintain their own body temperature," Mrs. Leese explained.

"Sure, the hospitals have what they need, but they're not 'special.' "

"What we have are standard-issue hospital supplies,'' said Diane Shaffer, of Jackson, a child development specialist in the neonatal intensive care units at West Penn and Allegheny General. Her educational background is in child development and special education with an emphasis on medically fragile children younger than 3 years old.

She said handmade items -- like those created by God's Precious Preemies Ministry -- are "the things that personalize the experience for the parents. You can't imagine how these little things mean so much."

Mrs. Leese said the hope is that the tiny sweaters and hats will go home with the baby and parents and serve as a sweet reminder of a difficult start. For some, however, the clothing may become a burial outfit or keepsake of a lost child.

"For me, the quilt my husband and I were given is my most precious belonging,'' Mrs. Leese said.

She's used everything from mailers and word-of-mouth to get out the word that Parent Resource Network is looking for sewers, knitters and crocheters.

Jan Shaffer, of Cranberry, heard of the outreach through a friend. Though she hasn't had a stillbirth or preemie birth -- she has three grown children -- Mrs. Shaffer's nephew in Georgia was the parent of a stillborn child.

"I know they got to hold her for a few hours and I know they dressed her up in some handmade clothes that had been given to the hospital. It meant a lot to him and his wife. I know he felt good seeing her dressed in something that was her own," Mrs. Shaffer recalled.

She knew her way around a crochet hook, having worked on afghans for years. She also participates with the St. Ferdinand "comfort blanket" ministry, which makes blankets and quilts for people who are ill or grieving.

"The [Helping Hands project] sounded like something I could do,'' said Mrs. Shaffer, who is not related to Diane Shaffer.

At first, she worked independently, crocheting pint-size blankets for the pint-size babies. "I had never read a pattern [for baby clothes] in my life,'' she said. Before long, she had branched out to infant clothing, finding patterns on the Internet and building her skills. She made dozens of items and gave them to Mrs. Leese for the Parent Resource Network.

One day, she decided she should expand her effort. She contacted Barb McCarthy, pastoral associate of St. Ferdinand.

"It ended up that we thought we could start a little group by advertising it in the [church] bulletin,'' Mrs. Shaffer said. She also contacted local retirement communities, nursing homes and shut-ins. They would call it God's Precious Preemies Ministry.

In the four months since the ministry began, active membership has grown to about 100 and word has spread. "I have a woman in California who heard about it and is mailing items to me,'' she said.

God's Precious Preemies Ministry meets monthly at St. Ferdinand. Its participants are not just church members.

At a meeting in September, more than a dozen women attended. They brought their hooks, needles and yarn, and most came with dozens of items that had been made at home or collected from shut-ins. The group seeks and accepts donations, though the materials for much of what is made are provided by the women themselves.

Diane Shaffer, who works with the babies and their parents in the neonatal care units, is amazed by what has been accomplished.

"I don't think these women have any idea what they're doing for the emotional well-being of the parents of our preemies. For every item they make, someone knows that someone who cares is reaching out to them and their precious child,'' she said.

For more information on the Parent Resource Network, call 1-877-647-4373.