Olives and Bananas

It's been a long while since I updated this blog. It's not that I won't ever again, I've just been really busy with other things: exhausted daily by my entertaining #rainbowbaby toddler, and also beginning a new small business adventure in wool and fibre art as Olives and Bananas.
My garden influences most of my work, and appears in my photography often as the colours of my wool pair so well with all the growing things. I love the combination of horticulture and fibre art.

I document my garden on Instagram using the tag #amysgardentbay ...and will someday get back to blogging about it. ;)
Find me on Instagram as @amyvervoort and @olivesandbanans and follow olivesandbananas.blog for more recent blogging.

Thanks for following!
Amy

Ma Petit Prince

Heather married us. She helped us organize the ceremony (in two weeks), helped us find the words for our vows, and made it all so... simple (in one word, all I ever wanted). She was our friend, my mother's friend, and also our neighbour. She's one of the reasons I miss our old home. There was nothing more lovely than hearing her play her piano while I dug around in my garden.

Heather was also one of the first to know of my pregnancy with Finn. We were at my mother's condo with Jean and Alison, some sherry, and some old gouda. I couldn't disguise my refusal of the sherry and old gouda. Heather was there all along as my belly grew and my mother faded away. She was there in the hospice at St. Joe's (with Jean and sherry and old gouda) on one of the last days my mother was alert.

She was there for me the morning my mother died, to hug me and counsel me in her front porch. She always has all the right things to say. There is a reason she floats a little, not just as she plays the piano but also when she walks.

Heather was one of the few people to meet Finn. She came by on the Friday before he died, when life was on the upswing, when nothing could go wrong. She gave him a knitted sock puppet in memory of his Nana, her friend. All the circles came together in love.

In the morning on the day we lost Finn I was asked a million times by people at the hospital who they could call - we needed our people, who could they call. I didn't know who to call. I don't have any people... my mother is gone, my father is gone, I don't have any parents, Rohan's parents are a hemisphere away, his whole family is in a different time zone, even as close as my sister seemed she was still too far away. I had nobody. 

They asked and asked again, who could they call, who could they call... finally it came to me - Heather. There was no one else.

She was there .. it seemed in an instant, and was there the whole time. She performed a naming ceremony to bless Finn's life, she held us holding him. I couldn't imagine that day without her. 

She performed Finn's memorial service. There was no one else.

There is no way to thank Heather for the way she has held our hearts through everything we've had to face in recent years. It's too much. How do you thank someone who has done so much?

When she was here to meet Finn she called him a little prince... a little nickname that has stayed with him. For her I made a needlefelted Le Petit Prince. He's from the scene where The Little Prince rakes his volcanoes, wearing his green outfit, blue belt, and yellow scarf.  

I made his asteroid - Asteroid B 612...

Then I made him a flock of wild birds...

I've been trying to string them as the mobile I see in my mind. 

It's working, I just have to tame the flock of wild birds a little.

When it's complete I'll take some better photos. I've really enjoyed making this one - it means a lot. It's been a challenge in design and engineering, wool, thread, fishing line, beads, and wooden rings. Every step has been made and constructed with Finn on my mind, and with Heather for all she did for my precious baby boy.

needlefelted dragonflies

I started needlefelting a few weeks ago. I had no idea how it was done, but was continually fascinated by the artistic creations I was seeing for sale on Etsy. I've been desperately needing something new to do, something to keep me preoccupied at home, keep my hands busy. I've always needed a creative outlet - photography, gardening, sewing, cooking.., and I've always like small crafts, fidgety things, details. 

I've also been wanting to do something special for some people who have done so much for me - more than I could ever put into words. Sarah, of course.. how will I ever be able to thank her for all she's done as a healer and as a friend. Making something to represent Finn - his conception, his pregnancy, his life, and his death has been healing in itself... it feels good to create things with him in mind. 

It's been difficult for both Rohan and I to count how many days we had Finn with us - was ten? Was it eleven? It borders the two and it's all a little confusing. The number eleven seems to be speaking a little louder these days, so for Sarah I made eleven little felted dragonflies flying around a felted branch. 

Needlefelting isn't complicated, and doesn't require a whole lot of equipment, and as I started I could only see more and more possibilities. It's been a great distraction for my mind and fingers. Each little dragonfly has unique blue markings of the wings, a blue bead eyes sewn on with metallic thread. Each one carefully brought to life to remember a life lost.

I've ordered a lot of wool from various places - some from Living Felt, a great resource for all things felted, including You Tube tutorials; and from places I've found on Etsy, straight from farms in New Zealand and closer to home in southern Ontario. Again, a new to me learning adventure, and already I've discovered preferences ..I can see the future wool snob developing in me. I'm constantly distracted with new project ideas. It's about the only thing that has distracted me in a positive way since we lost Finn.

I know Sarah will love her dragonflies and with them remember Finn. Her peaceful and calming way is so much like all the nice things we hear about dragonflies, the two go very well together.