Friends...this is that post.

Greetings All,

Amie did it.  She finally did it.  She decided that being here wasn't worth the trouble and all the fight she was putting up.  She passed in her sleep tonight, some time between Midnight and 3am.

It's strange, the mix of sadness and relief we're both feeling.  Sadness that this little ball of energy and eloquence and joy and delight will no longer be with us.  Relief that she is no longer shot full of pain and discomfort.

I wrote this post originally on the 5th, and it's been sitting here since.  When I originally wrote it, I was really worried about what I was going to remember (hence the pictures that will soon follow these words).  But, I'm strangely not so worried about that right now.

Someone mentioned the other day on one of the blog comments (which we always read!) that maybe this time period, the week+ in a coma, was a way for Amie to let us down easy, to get us ready for the time period to come.  Shelley said the same thing to me as well, without reading the comment.  I think this time period, as hard as it was (and it was excruciatingly hard), was a very useful way to transition us from where we were to where we needed to be, all within a week.

Arrangements will proceed later on today, and we'll announce them here once we have them.

In order to start the process of crafting the memories in our permanent mental slide show, and bringing much more positive ones to the fore, here's a few pictures from happier times, all from the past year.

Shelley and Amie loved spending time outside, and where better than the peony gardens right outside Mott.  For those of you who haven't been there in the spring, they're a sight to see.

Amie at Mott, once again, but looking fierce and silly, for me.  

Amie with her precious pigtails, that she was so proud of growing back.

Amie wearing her favorite dress of the summer of 2014, which she called her "Syrup Dress", because she got syrup on it the first time she wore it.  As soon as it came out of the laundry each day, she asked to wear it. 

In this picture, she has "braid across" the hairstyle that she enjoyed seeing on Anya, and wanted so desperately to wear again for herself.   She got that wish by the end of the summer, for just a little bit, before she started losing her hair again.  She's also wearing her Hawai'i hair accessory that she and Anya got so that they could be twinsies.    So much memory all packed into one little snapshot.

As I said, more to come in the days ahead.  

Good job, Ams the bombs.  You did it.