Me and The Squirrel Lady

I can assure you that this is not what I envisioned when I enrolled in fashion school. When I try to figure out how it happened my own advice to my son is what comes back to haunt me.

“School is the first step. It will open doors you don’t even know exist.”

Watching the video of a pigeon bopping around in a prototype of a sweater I’d designed for it made me realize how prophetic those words were.

It all started with the Australian wildfires. I was one of the well-meaning crafters who wanted to help by way of scissors and sewing machine. Through quick connections made I ended up getting in contact with an NGO on the ground in Australia. The next thing I knew I was organizing all the donations for Eastern Ontario. The NGO had arranged for one plane to fly across Canada picking up donations along the way – one plane, that was it. They did not want to flood rescue efforts with unwanted or unneeded donations.

My first task, aside from organizing and arranging pick ups, was to make some donations. Seeing that I was getting overwhelmed my neighbour generously came over one day to help cut, press and sew many, many wallaby bags. All I remember is wallaby bags!

SooOOOOoooOOooo many wallaby bags.

Next came collection. Donations came in little by little and then a lot by a lot! Finally, it was time to make the last pick-ups and take everything to the airport.

Naturally, since we were headed to one of the winteriest (I think I just made up that word!) capital cities in the world, Ottawa Canada, there was a huge snowstorm in the forecast for that evening. We wanted to get ahead of it but we were still waiting for one donation. It didn’t come in until after 4pm. I vividly remember how terrible the weather was that night but my husband, my driver, didn’t flinch! With Eric behind the wheel everything carried on as if we were on a sunny summer drive. We even stopped afterward for a celebratory drink.

Poor Eric always gets roped into my crazy schemes. Just a few nights ago we were wading through mosquito infested grass searching for an injured owl. Truth be told it was me who had to drag him out of the ditch. He was determined to find that owl and bring it to the bird sanctuary. Unfortunately, something or someone beat us to it. On the ride home I wondered to myself again, “How did we end up spending our Saturday nights this way?”

Part of the answer is Ruby. She was on the Quebec side of the Australia effort. We connected somewhere between the plane taking off from Canada and landing in Australia. We both had the same idea: If we can craft for Australia then why not craft for local rescues too? That was the beginning of East Ontario West Quebec Rescue Crafters.

While Ruby and her mother were in charge of non-stop crafting my primary job was to basically design patterns and manage our social media. Ruby is a long-standing volunteer for a squirrel rescue so one of our first projects was to create little sleeping bags for their orphans. Cat and dog rescues received toys, beds and bandanas. We hosted sew-ins where a bunch of us met up, made donations and ate cookies. As we continued on other volunteers stepped up and began knitting and crocheting nests for birds, blankets for dogs and even stuffy companions for rabbits.

I was excited when the bird sanctuary gave us a big list of needs (including that infamous flight suit which was meant to protect injured birds from picking at their own wounds). With many successes to be proud of, I have to say, the flight suit turned out to be my biggest rescue failure.

Why?

Corona Virus came to Canada.

...and everything changed.

No flight suits were made. We tried to resist the mask making craze for as long as we could but when it became clear that hospitals needed our help, we had no choice but to answer the call.

We made masks for heart and cancer patients, gowns for inner-city walk-in clinics and homeless shelters and hundreds of caps for nurses and doctors throughout the Ottawa and Montreal regions.

With worries about the virus spreading volunteers started to drop off but Ruby and her mother and a core of other dedicated volunteers kept going. Trying to keep up with them was both inspiring and challenging!

The moment we were able to catch our breath we started collecting for animal rescues again. Presently Eric and I drive around doing porch pick-ups about once a month. Donations also go between the provinces via Eric and Ruby's husband who coordinate drop offs and pick ups of their own (she's got a great hubby too!).

Ruby and I have now started to refer to each other as the Squirrel Lady and the Bird Lady because somewhere along the way Eric and I turned our car into a part-time ambulance for the bird rescue. Usually we have success but like the pigeon suit and owl, sometimes we fall short. Still 'failure' and 'forget it' are not synonymous and late doesn't mean out of time. The world got topsy turvy for a while but need never went away. There is no shortage of second chances when comes to making a difference. It is never too late.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have some tiny sweaters to make.