Today is the day they give away babies...

Phrase oft repeated by an old Irish lady I know.
The complete phrase is "today is the day they give away babies with half a pound of tea"
Any ideas out there. It almost sounds like sealing wax stuff but...

Quoted verbatim from the following hyperlink:

"Today is the day they give babies away: "The Day They Gave Babies Away" is a story by Dale Eunson that appeared in the Christmas 1946 number of Cosmopolitan, their most successful Christmas story ever. It was published as a book the following year. Perhaps more to the point, there was a soldiers' ditty circulating in the 1940s that went "Today is the day they give babies away / with a half a pound of tea. / If you know any ladies who want any babies / Just send them round to me." [AW]"