Super Netball gun Amy Parmenter tie-dying to raise money for charity and pay tribute to her mum

Amy Parmenter is a pretty handy netballer.

The Giants wing defence burst onto the Super Netball scene in 2019, winning the league’s rookie of the year. In 2020, her tenacious ability to shut down a player and hunt a loose ball saw her named in the Team of the Year and selected into the Netball Australia Development Squad.

But it turns out, the 23-year-old is also a pretty handy fundraiser.

Her mother Gilly died of cancer when Parmenter was just 15, and raising money for cancer research and support programs became the only way she — the eldest of four children — felt she could help.

“Mum had a really rare form of Mesothelioma cancer and it was something I really struggled with while she was sick, because I just felt so hopeless,” Parmenter said.

“I think anyone that has lost a loved one to cancer knows that feeling and there’s nothing you can do at the time, except be by their side.”

As a teenager, Parmenter cut her hair twice to raise money for the cause, but in 2017, when she and younger sister Daisy were looking for a hobby to kill time over the summer, they decided to reprise one of their family’s favourite pastimes.

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“We went to Byron Bay one year and at the markets they were doing DIY tie-dye that you could take home, and my mum couldn’t believe how expensive it was,” she said.

“She went off and bought some tie-dying kits and we ended up doing it at school fetes and even just at home.

“Daisy and I were talking about how we could do that for fun again and once we did, a heap of friends and family started asking us where they could get some tie-dye because they also really loved it.”

“That’s when we thought we could use it as an opportunity to raise some money for cancer research in memory of our Mum.”

And so, The Tie Dye Project was born.

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November seemed the obvious choice to stage an annual event, given Gilly’s birthday and the anniversary of her death both fall inside the month.

And Parmenter says being surrounded by all the colours, as well as the loved ones who get involved, has turned a sad time into more of a celebration.

“Mum always used to joke that she had a birthday month, not a birthday. So it’s a really nice way to celebrate her memory.”

Meeting Molly changes the game

In the first couple of years, the girls started small and raised $5,000 by dying T-shirts and a mixture of accessories like tote bags and scrunchies.

But at the end of 2018, Parmenter met 12-year-old bone cancer patient Molly Croft while doing an appearance with the Giants — and that’s when things really took off.

“We walked into the Sydney Children’s Hospital Radiothon and Molly came straight up to us, smiling from ear to ear,” she said.

“She is a big netball fan and is from Dubbo, but was living at the Ronald McDonald House in Sydney at the time, because she had been diagnosed with a high-grade osteosarcoma in her leg.

“Molly was going through some of the worst chemotherapy there is and yet she blew me away with her resilience and the gratitude she had for life.

“We kept in touch and she actually became an inspiration for me during my first year in the Giants team. She gave me so much purpose and the smile she had every time we visited made all the hard parts of elite sport worth it.”

In 2019, with Croft now involved, The Tie Dye Project went to another level.

They made a website with a logo incorporating Croft’s family motto to “find a rainbow in every day”, which helped them to attract sponsorship and increase their output.

Parmenter’s teammates at the Giants also got involved, helping to tie-dye items, deliver parcels and to promote the cause on their social media channels.

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That year, they raised almost $25,000. This year they have already passed $23,000 — with 100 per cent of that money going to the Sydney Children’s Hospital Keeping Back on Track program.

Parmenter says The Tie Dye Project is just another example of the power of the netball community.

“I always get asked ‘why did you play netball?’,” she said.

“I didn’t start playing until I was in my teens and I was playing all these other sports at the time… but when I got to that stage where I had to make a choice, it was around the same time that my mum was really sick.

“I would go to netball and just be treated like the exact same person. It made it much easier to skip parties and social events because I was surrounded by these strong, powerful, like-minded young women when I was at netball.

“It made me fall in love with the game and I really did chose the sport because of the girls I got to play with and the people I met. I still feel like that today.”