Once we were all ready to go, I grabbed THE blanket, and we all got in the car to leave. I just think it's ironic that I wanted that blanket so badly, and it had now become the blanket that she was put in the minute she born as well as the blanket she was swaddled in when she took her last breath.
The man at the funeral home pulled Brandon and me into a private room to talk with him right when we got there. He said the doctor performing the autopsy had sent off for more tests so it was most likely that the cause of death would be SIDS. There was no heart trouble, no pneumonia, no choking on spit up....NOTHING. And to me, SIDS is not an answer at all. It's a fancy way to say, "We have no clue what happened."
He took us through a back entrance so we could go and see Avery Kate. She was beautiful! She had on her white gown with her name monogrammed in pink and her big pink bow. Her lips did look a little funny, but other than that, she looked like she was sound asleep. I kept trying to hold her cold hands to warm them. It was hard to get close to her because the smell of embalming fluid was really overwhelming. I looked up and saw all the flowers pouring in. They were beautiful! I noticed the arrangement right next to her said, "From Keith and Girls." That just killed me. That's what I called Hallie and Avery Kate...The Girls, My girls. I realized I would never be able to refer to them as that again. It crushed me. The rest of our close family came in. It was just so sad to see such a tiny coffin and a perfectly healthy baby inside of it. Our slide show was playing on the TV..all 96 pictures were on there. It still was so hard to swallow. They ended up moving us to the bigger room because so many people came to pay their respects. I even had some students and former students show up. They were just so young to have to see something like this, but they came and supported me. Hallie kept asking to go see Avery Kate, so we would take her. "Why her lips do like this mom?" I knew she would notice that. She never misses a thing. I just kept trying to explain that Avery Kate was going to go to Heaven to be with Jesus. She was just so little and didn't understand. She wanted me to go get her and take her home with us. Honestly, so did I!
It was a very long day, but we made it. I held her blanket tightly by side the entire day. Then it was time to finally say goodbye to our baby for the last time. Everyone said their goodbyes first and Brandon and I were last. We held each others hands tightly and walked up to her. We took the blanket that was in her coffin and tucked her in just the way she liked to be tucked in at home. We kissed her and didn't want to let go.
We finally walked out to Brandon's truck and made the slow ride to the church. The other cars on the road seemed to all be pulling over to pay their respects for her. A lady was jogging on side of the road. She stopped and bowed her head in reverence. It was all one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. I literally felt like the entire town on Lake Charles had stopped their lives for just a moment in respect for Avery Kate.
Once we were all at the church Father Keith started the mass. Everything was perfect. Denine and Heather read the readings. Jessica and Jenny carried up the gifts. And our brothers, Jacob, Eric, Kyle, and Cody were the pallbearers. Brandon even gave a speech about his beautiful daughter. He was amazing up there. The music was absolutely beautiful! I just kept thinking that only two short weeks before this, we were all standing in this very spot baptising her into the Catholic faith, and now here we are celebrating her short life and her going home to Jesus. I must say, I didn't think of it as a celebration though. Then, the mass was over and we headed to the graveyard. There was a chapel there, and we held a little ceremony there for her. When the crowd had all gathered in the chapel, Father Keith belted out Amazing Grace. Tears fell from his eyes and slowly dripped down his cheeks. He never wiped them nor did he miss a beat. It was the most beautiful sound I had ever heard. Then we took her to her final resting place, Baby Land. The plot was so deep. They asked if I wanted to see her go into the ground, and I absolutely did. I wanted to be sure that her body was in there, so that when I visited in the future, I would never have to wonder anything. Well our poor brothers were the ones who had to put her in there. I had just assumed that there was a machine of some sort to lower the casket into the ground. Nope! I still remember the look on those boys' faces as they placed their precious niece into the ground. I felt terrible that they had to do that!
Then we all went back to Mr. Keith's house. I'm pretty sure I sat at his table without getting up for a couple hours. I visited with all my New Iberia friends. It was nice to have all my friends and family all there, just sad that death always has a way of bringing everyone together. When we got home that night, we noticed a tree planted in our back yard. It was a dog wood tree. Brandon's friends had come and planted the tree in her memory. There was a little story to go along with it and everything. It was aboslutely amazing! We really do have the best support system. I remember lying in bed that night with Avery Kate's blanket and feeling calm, relaxed, and peaceful. The blanket still smelled like her, so I just closed my eyes and pretended she was there with me. I know in my heart that she was.
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