Stony Brook University Hospital NICU babies get first book, 'NIC Zoo,' penned by Long Island mom
At left: Paige Pedroli wrote "Welcome to the NIC Zoo" after both of her daughters, Penelope, 7, and Sydney, 3, stayed in the neonatal intensive care unit at Stony Brook University Hospital in 2018 and 2022, respectively. At right: Jessica Valerio, of Miller Place, reads the book to her son Dominic, who spent more than two months in the NICU at the same hospital this year. Credit: Pedroli family; Jessica Valerio
Paige Pedroli, 34, of Holbrook, holds up a tiny onesie covered with teddy bears intended for a premature baby weighing just 2 to 4 pounds. “I brought a baby outfit so you could see how small the baby is,” she tells the rapt preschoolers at Leeway School in Sayville.
She’s teaching the 3-year-olds in her daughter Sydney’s class about neonatal intensive care units, where newborns stay if they are born too early or too ill to go home from the hospital. Parents refer to the unit as the NICU for short, pronounced "Nick-you." Pedroli opens a children’s board book called, “Welcome to the NIC Zoo,” with colorful, vivid illustrations of baby giraffes, lions and honeybees instead of baby humans.
Paige Pedroli reads her book, "Welcome to the NIC Zoo," beside her daughter Sydney, 3, in Sydney's class at Leeway School in Sayville. Credit: Barry Sloan
Pedroli wrote the book after both of her daughters, Penelope, 7, and Sydney, 3, stayed in the NICU at Stony Brook University Hospital in 2018 and 2022, respectively. The self-published book won this year’s 2025 NYC Big Book Award for children’s board books. The organization called it “a therapeutic resource.” Says Ted Olczak, chief marketing officer, “She successfully put together a message of hope and comfort.”
"Welcome to the NIC Zoo" was inspired by author Paige Pedroli's experience having two NICU babies. Credit: Barry Sloan
On Dec. 7, at Little Nook Book Store in Wading River, Pedroli held a book signing during which, for every book she sold, she designated another to donate to Stony Brook University Hospital’s NICU for parents to read to their hospitalized newborns, some of whom are in incubators and can’t be held yet by their parents.
On Dec. 12, she delivered 30 books. It was Pedroli’s second such donation, a gesture that Eliana Duarte, the NICU’s neonatal nurse manager, called “touching” for staff and families. “Some of these babies are so ill that the only thing the parent can do is read to the babies, so they can hear their voices,” Duarte says. “We had a lot of staff that cried when we read it.”
58 DAYS AND COUNTING
Jessica and Peter Valerio, both 33 and teachers from Miller Place, received two copies during Pedroli’s last donation drive. They kept one in the NICU where they could read it to Dominic, born three months early.
The 12-page book includes rhymes such as: “Many new cubs are arriving today. Some leave with their families, while others must stay,” and “Days turn to weeks, turn to month, sometimes more! Those babies hang on till it’s their turn to soar!” Readers see an octopus nurse using its eight arms to juggle care for five babies at once; they see two baby bunnies in incubators with the names Penelope and Sydney in honor of Pedroli's daughters.
“It was nice to read something that was so relatable at a time that is so scary and isolating,” Jessica says.
The second copy they kept at home to read to their older son, Mikey, 2. “It helped him understand, in a very childhood way, where his brother is and when he’s coming home,” Jessica says in a phone interview from the NICU on Dominic’s 58th day there. Dominic has since come home.
Peter Valerio, of Miller Place, reads to his older son, Mikey, 2, to help explain why Mikey’s newborn brother stayed at Stony Brook University Hospital. Credit: Jessica Valerio
NICU STORIES
Pedroli and her husband, Ken, now 34 and working in sales, were unexpectedly introduced to the NICU after Pedroli experienced placenta abruption with her older daughter, which is when the flow of oxygen and nutrients is cut off to the womb. She had an emergency C-section; Penelope spent 10 weeks in the NICU. Penelope needed follow-up medical care and was eventually diagnosed with autism.
With Sydney, Pedroli’s water broke at 34 weeks, and Sydney weighed 5 pounds, 8 ounces. She was in the NICU for 14 days connected to a feeding tube to help her grow but didn’t have any follow up medical issues, Pedroli says.
Pedroli, who had never written a book before, collaborated with her sister, Lindsay McElhinney, 28, a business owner from Charleston, South Carolina, to find a graphic artist who could do the artwork for "Welcome to the NIC Zoo."
McElhinney connected Pedroli with illustrator Elena Hernandez, 29, of Richmond, Virginia. “I was also a preemie baby,” says McElhinney, who weighed 1½ pounds at birth and spent 26 weeks in a NICU. “I was so small my mother’s wedding ring could literally slide up my arm." She called illustrating the book “the perfect project for me.”
Pedroli had 1,000 copies printed and sells them on her website and Amazon for $20 each; she sold them at a reduced price of $10 each during the donation drive on Dec. 7. She’s hoping to do more readings at Long Island schools, and says she may tackle another board book, this one about autism based on her experiences with her older daughter. “It is an idea in the back of my mind,” she says.
Beth Whitehouse writes about families, parenting and great things to do with the kids on Long Island. She’s been a Newsday editor and shared a 1997 Newsday staff Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the crash of TWA Flight 800.
