Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Velveteen Bunnies


"Velveteen Bunnies"
8x10 acrylic on canvas panel
Available through DPW gallery/auction

I told this story once before, but it bears repeating I think.

As a young child growing up, I remember that we always had bunnies in the yard. I lived in a 2-family house that we rented the first floor of, and every day in the summer I would walk into the backyard to find the bunnies. Our backyard was full of a mixture of grass, weeds, flowers & fruit trees - what I always called my "garden of Eden." The bunnies seemed to love the yard also as they could be found there pretty much every day.

I had a very personal attachment to them ever since my mother had read me the story of The Velveteen Rabbit If you are not familiar with it, it's a wonderful story about a stuffed velveteen rabbit that a young boy had while he was sick - and how it one day "left" only to become a real bunny (click the link to see/read a free online version of this wonderful story)! 

When I was a young child, I had a stuffed rabbit that had "disappeared" suddenly after I had gotten over one of my childhood diseases, and I firmly believed it had become real and was one of the bunnies in the yard. In fact, I thought all the bunnies in my yard (and there were quite a few) were all once stuffed bunnies that had left & became real - and that everyone in my neighborhood had heard the Velveteen Rabbit story! 

My friend Joey Riggi and I were determined to catch one of these bunnies. We set-up a box with a string & stick -- and a wonderful carrot we "borrowed" from old Uncle Mike's garden (Shhhh, don't tell him!). But the bunnies were too smart - they didn't fall for those traps. So then Joey & I decided to dig holes in the yard, then cover them with twigs, leaves & grass clumps. We laid the carrot pieces on top of the camouflaged holes & waited. But all we caught was my poor mother as she walked out into the yard to hang the just washed laundry. (Joey & I had to fill in all the holes in the yard and I had to help with re-washing the sheets!) 

I never caught the bunny, but it visited me that summer often!

1 comment:

Autumn Leaves said...

I've never read the Velveteen Rabbit so I appreciate your synopsis of the story, Nancie. What a wonderful story and I can see how that would fire a child's imagination when seeing bunnies out in the yard. These two are adorable!

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