PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — A Pinellas County middle school teacher got students to make hundreds of blankets for kids being treated at All Children’s Hospital.

It’s a tradition Betsy Mauro started a decade ago as a way of giving back to the hospital in honor of her son, who was a patient there.

Dozens of students at Pinellas Preparatory Academy made the fleece blankets in their classrooms.

“Make sure to do double knots because we don’t want (them) to come undone,” said Mauro as she was looking over the work of some of the students.

At times, she was acting as a cheerleader of sorts as the students worked on the blankets.

“I am. I’m a little crazy. That’s part of being a seventh-grade teacher. You have to be a little bit nuts,” she said.

Mauro came up with the idea for the blankets for the hospital patients after her son Chris was diagnosed with leukemia and got treatment at All Children’s. A family friend gave Chris a fleece blanket.

“And that blanket went with us everywhere,” said Mauro. “It went to the hospital and doctor’s visits.”

When Mauro started delivering blankets to the hospital each year, Chris would help. But sadly, leukemia eventually took his life.

This is the 10th year Mauro has gotten students to make the blankets. She said lots of the students have been patients at All Children’s at some point in their life, so they have a good feeling about being a part of the project. This year, Mauro said the students had made more than 400 blankets.

Mauro had great hopes for how the blankets would be received by the patients.

“I hope they feel that they are cared for. That they are thought about by somebody, not just their family are friends that they know,” she said. “That they do know that people in the community do care about them. That they want them to get better and that they are loved.”

Mauro delivered the blankets to the hospital just before Thanksgiving.