Every child dreams of seeing their creations come to life and Kayla O’Connell is turning those dreams into a reality. “I sew it all up,” said O’Connell. “I try to match it as closely as possible.” O’Connell receives illustrations from children battling cancer and uses felt to create a stuffy. “Being able to bring that to life for them, whatever their imagination is,” said O’Connell. “It is for them to bring to treatment and have on those really tough days.” The idea came to O’Connell after going through what she recalls as one of the “toughest times” in her life. “I noticed a lump on my little one’s belly,” said O’Connell. “He was 15 months old at the time and we took him to emerge here in London and quickly found out it was a tumour that needed to be removed.” O’Connell said they received a call that the surgery was a success and her son would not need chemotherapy. “Your whole life changes, you don’t know what’s next, but we were so thankful for that,” she said. “With that, we were exposed to a lot of things, a world we knew nothing about which was children living with childhood cancer.” From there, “Brave Buddies” was born. “They can draw whatever they like,” said O’Connell. “There’s some really amazing drawings that come in with lots of detail.” O’Connell said she works with Childcan, a charity located in London Ont., that supports children and families affected by childhood cancer. “I get to witness as part of this job here is witness those really good, meaningful times where kids do get that rest and briefly forget about everything that’s going on and just enjoy this moment,” said Todd Goold with Childcan. “This is just one of many supports that we provide but this one is something we’ve never done before.” O’Connell said she has made roughly 12 stuffies since January and hopes this is just the beginning for ‘Brave Buddies’. “This project is giving them an opportunity to be creative,” said O’Connell. “It gives me an opportunity to be creative and then it brings smiles to both of us.”
