I met Belinda only a handful of times at my sister-in-law Jill's house, but I have heard a thousand and one stories of her goodness, her fun sense of adventure, her event-planning skills, and her overall awesomeness.  I always appreciated Belinda's nurturing of our dear Jill, particularly during difficult times, but a couple years ago I found myself the recipient of her generosity and her willing to go the extra mile - for me, a near stranger.

While a very poor student living in Boston, my husband and traveled to Utah for my grandmother's funeral.  I was about seven months pregnant.  While there, I became very sick with food poisoning (indulged in too much jello salad that had been sitting out for too long, likely) and went into premature labor.  Our daughter was born the next day and was immediately admitted to the NICU.  Because she was born prematurely, she had some problems -  mostly with eating, gaining weight, and staying warm enough.  I was strongly encouraged to breastfeed, but my tiny daughter was too little to suckle properly so I used one of the hospitals machines to pump milk while she was in the NICU.  When the time came for her to go home, she was doing much better, but she still couldn't nurse as well as she needed to in order to gain weight.  We looked at breast pumps at the hospital lactation store, and were aghast to discover that they were several hundred dollars (recall that we were poor students at the time and suddenly facing massive hospital bills).
As I was complaining to Jill, she said, "Hey, my friend has a really nice pump she wanted to give away."  She called Belinda to see if the pump was still available, but unfortunately, Belinda had taken it to D.I. a  couple days previously.
I thought the matter was closed until a few hours later she called Jill back.  She had gone back to the D.I. and spoken to the manager about the pump. Somehow he had found it, and she got it back and gave it to Jill to give it to me.  I was astonished that somebody I barely knew would go to that much trouble for me.  I was also enormously grateful - it saved us so much money and really helped us out at a time of crisis.
Now I have another baby daughter, and I still use the set she gave me (including the bottles, ice packs, and messenger bag that came with the pump).  I think of Belinda every time I use the pump to provide nourishment for my baby, and I think that's fitting because from all accounts she was surely one of the most nurturing women ever to live.
~Laura Dickey