Tuggeranong residents were treated to some real magic last weekend.
A huge, man-made star appeared to hang suspended above Urambi Hills, twinkling in the night sky on Saturday.
It was a very special tribute, and real labour of love, by well-known Canberra woman Suzanne Tunks for her daughter Stella, who passed away on September 5, 2011, aged just nine months, as the result of congenital heart disease.
Suzanne, with her family, trudged up Urambi Hills, opposite Lake Tuggeranong, and laid out the shape of the star onto the rocks of one of the peaks, using only solar-powered garden lights. The end result was a massive star, 40-metres at its longest side, that lit up the sky and caused a sensation.
Stella would have turned 10 on December 10 last year and Suzanne had originally planned the tribute then but bushfire smoke soon put an end to that plan.
But with the weather looking good and a decade since she had since her daughter, Suzanne decided to go ahead last weekend, wanting the star to shine up to Stella.
"I describe how exciting it was, it just looked so perfect," she said.
"And I have since been told that a lot of people were very emotional about it and it brought up a lot of emotions for them."
The star could be seen from her home in Kambah and during the night, Suzanne got up to look at it and remember her daughter.
"I think it was really nice for other people, because it was completely out of nowhere. It's been a pretty bleak year for a lot of people, so that was an unintended side effect, a silver lining," she said.
"It actually feels like a dream now."
In 2012, Suzanne launched the Stella Bella Little Stars Foundation in honour of her daughter. The foundation aims to brighten the lives of children with serious and long-term illnesses and provide support and financial assistance to their families.
The foundation also runs the Stella Bella Children's Centre in Fyshwick, a mainstream daycare centre as well as respite centre for sick children.
Her worked was recognised in the 2018 Australian of the Year Awards when she was the ACT Local Hero.
Suzanne installed the star with her daughters Amelia, 26, and Ruby, who is nine on Saturday, sister Shiobhan and partner Matthew Frawley. (Her oldest daughter Laura, 29, is in England.) They took it down the next morning. A brief, shining moment to treasure.
"It was just a thing from me to her, it was something I'd thought about for a long time and it was just so beautiful and made me really happy," she said.
The star also resonated for a family who happened to have tragically lost a loved one last weekend and reached out to Suzanne to tell her their story.
"He'd died unexpectedly in his sleep and the whole family was devastated. This lady's grandmother had always told her when someone dies look up to the sky to find the brightest star," Suzanne said.
"So everyone was having a terrible day and the lady went to get an ice cream for her daughter to cheer her up and they came around the corner and saw our giant star. They were both very emotional and happy and felt it was a sign.
"I also got lots of messages from people who had lost children themselves - 28 years ago, two years ago, just last year. And they felt it have them some comfort. So it was nice that it gave something to others."
