Photo captures 31 babies born under B.C. wildfire evacuations
Parents hope for lifelong connection
They are too young to know it now, but a group of babies in B.C.'s Interior have a unique connection: all were born away from home, against the backdrop of the province's worst recorded wildfire season.
That connection has now been captured in photos taken when a group of 31 mothers got together with their babies to meet and share stories as part of the newly-formed "Summer 2017 Fire Babies" group.
The group was formed by Amy Emery of 150 Mile House, whose own experience of giving birth while under evacuation made her want to meet others who'd done the same.
"It was an amazing birth story," she said.
"[But] it was kind of hard. So I figured, like, these mothers would want other women to talk to and compare notes and compare stories with."
Born away from home
Emery had checked into hospital in Williams Lake on July 6, thinking her water had broken. That turned out to be a false alarm, but less than 24 hours later she would be dealing with another urgent matter.
"My wife had gone home to check on things and she did a U-turn on her way," Emery explained.
"Because she'd seen on the side of the road a fire, and she was like, 'Oh no, I'm not going to have my wife in hospital unable to get her.'"
The couple drove straight to Prince George which is where Emery did eventually give birth to a son, Carver, a full 35 days later.
"We weren't able to return home because of the smoke," Emery said.
After posting to Facebook, Emery connected with dozens of others with similar stories from all across the region.
Giving back
After chatting online, 31 'wildfire babies' and their parents got together in person on Sept. 9.
The main order of business was a group photo taken by Laureen Carruthers Photography of Williams Lake.
Carruthers said she was motivated to donate her studio space and time because of all the help she'd received while living as an evacuee.
"Everywhere was so helpful for us for fires. It just seemed like a good thing to do," she said.
In order to get the shot she divided the babies into groups against the same background and then stitched the photos together.
For now, she's simply providing the photos to the mothers but says she may put them into a calendar to help with wildfire recovery.
A lifelong connection
The mothers are also fundraising — so far they've gathered over $300 which they gave to volunteers who helped look after animals during the evacuation.
Plans are underway to do more volunteer work, as well as get together for important milestones such as first birthdays, and anniversaries of the evacuations.
Emery said she's inviting all the other families in the group to Carver's first birthday.
"We should probably have a firefighter theme," she laughed.
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