Sadly...

R.I.P. BEAUTIFUL SOPHIE

Sadly, one month after moving into our current abode, we lost our beautiful Sophie. She was 15 years old and had made the transition to our new home very well. She was relaxed and obviously contented - alternately snoozing in the sun in my room, or outside in a little 'nest' she had made beneath the living room window. It was in her nest that my daughter found her, curled up. She had had a stroke and was badly affected down one side, so we made the decision to have her put to sleep. She was not distressed or in any pain, so we kept her with us overnight to say our goodbyes and I took her to the vet the next morning. It was over in seconds, and she remained calm right to the end.

  

I wasn't intending to plant anything in the garden yet because it simply isn't ready for planting, but I brought her home to bury and needed to put something over her to mark her place in our lives. I found a lovely small evergreen magnolia hybrid called Fairy which only grows to 2 metres.

 We have bought some solar-powered fairy lights to lie on the ground around the base. When the tree is larger, possibly we might thread them around the branches. 

Sophie was a part of our family for so long. She was my daughter's 7th birthday present and so has always been in her life really. The other cats and dog obviously missed her. As my daughter held Sophie before we buried her, Diego came up and sniffed her and very gently touched her face with his paw, the way he and Delphi often reach up and touch our faces.

Goodbye, Old Sophie. Gone but never forgotten.