Schools
Bagels and Bubbly to Start School, Raise Funds
A celebration and a fundraiser on the first day of school for the St. Barnabas NICU.
On the first day of school last year, Karen Pisciotta made an announcement, "Champagne at my house next year." She made this announcement because on September 7, 2010, all her children would be in school. Her twin girls would be starting kindergarten in 2010.
She kept her word.
Today, Tuesday, September 7, 2010, Karen, along with co-host Lynn Sands, had a "bagels and bubbly" party at her home in Maplewood to celebrate the milestone.
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But there's a twist. This get-together was also a fundraiser for the Saint Barnabas Medical Center Neonatal Intensive Care Unit through the Saint Barnabas Foundation. Pisciotta's twin girls were born seven weeks premature. Today marked a milestone for the girls and a celebration for the family.
"The first year was the hardest," Karen started. "I had my son at home, but the girls were in the NICU. I didn't know where I should be. My entire family was not here [at home] yet. I had to leave the girls in the NICU and go home to my husband and son." The first year included many challenges and much hard work to help the twins make their developmental milestones.
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While Pisciotta felt pulled in two directions at one time, the doctors and nurses in the NICU took good care of the babies and of the parents. "They [the nurses] knew just when to give you a tissue and to tell you it will be alright," said Pisciotta.
And the nurses were right. The twins started kindergarten just when they should. Karen came up with this idea as a way to say "thank you" and to continue to support the work of the dedicated doctors and nurses of the Saint Barnabas NICU. "They would not be the students they are today if not for the care they received at St. Barnabas' NICU," says Pisciotta proudly.
Amidst the bagels and bubbly, there were many normal conversations, of who got which teacher, of teary-eyed goodbyes, of older children not wanting to be seen with parents, of perfectly normal everyday things that would not have been possible for Karen and all the others helped by the Saint Barnabas NICU.
