Telling Hallie

I realized that I forgot to mention the moment when we had to tell Hallie that she would never see her baby sister again. We went to pick her up from Mrs. Kathy's at around 4:00 I guess. Brandon and I slowly walked up her driveway and tried to put on a happy face. I remember seeing Mrs. Kathy, her neighbor, and Mikie right there at the door, but we went straight to Hallie. She was sitting on the couch just so happy and innocent. She had no idea what had happened that day, and then again would she ever really know what happened? She was so excited to have mom and dad picking her up! We both just squeezed her tight. How were we going to tell her? What were we going to say? We said nothing. We just smiled and pretended everything was ok. We buckled her into her carseat and I waited for the question. She looked over to Avery Kate's carseat. "Where A-E Kate?" Brandon and I looked at each other. "Umm....well, she went to Heaven baby." "Why?" "Well, she went to be with Jesus." "Oh." That was it. I knew she had no clue what we were talking about. Hallie was just so excited to see all her grandparents and other family members that afternoon that she just played and was happy as can be, just as we hoped she would be.
It's hard enough to have lost a child, but to care for a sad child and comfort her for the loss of her sister.... I don't know if I could have done it. Hallie was at the perfect age to experience this tragic loss. She knew her sister; she loved her; she remembered her. But she did not understand that she would never see her again on this earth. She knew she went to Heaven, but where exactly that was, she did not know.