Obituary

💜🌻Vogue Te Manawa Elers🌻💜

Our Baby was born March 23rd 2017.

Her schedule C-section was actually for the 22nd but due to other emergencies her birth was delayed a day. We strongly believe our baby had a hand in this so she could grace us with her presence on the 23rd, the same as her brother.
In 2016 I was unwell for 3 months, upon recovery from my kidney troubles we were blessed with our 5th pregnancy, a complete shock but so very welcomed. We always said we wanted a big family and our one and only conversation about starting a family was when I asked Rick he said 7 kids, I said what about 5 Rick said ‘OK’.
So when we fell with Voguey we were over the moon after all my medical issues just weeks earlier.

Our Voguey’s pregnancy wasn’t all smooth sailing, she had some heart issues which she fought and overcome and continued to grow happy and healthy after a few scary weeks! This is how we got her name… Her unique first name because she was so special and her middle name Te Manawa which means The Heart.

Our baby was born absolutely devine.
Beautiful brown skin, perfect little face and within days we knew we had been blessed with another gentle-natured pepe.

She was a dream and filled our hearts. She had her siblings wrapped around her finger and they would fight for her attention.

On a winning streak, we scored another baby who loved to sleep and she was sleeping through the night at only 4 weeks.

Before the one month had rolled around our baby was smiling, and showed that she had mummy’s dimples.

Her first year was a dream but she showed early signs of sassiness. She didn’t smile unless it was us, but she would certainly take everything in….

Her comforting mechanisms including sucking her bottom lip under top lip, which progressed to rubbing her blankies on her lips and in more recent years the blankie was substituted for a shirt that we had recently worn.

Around her first birthday she developed a type of smile that I can only describe as her daddy’s lazy drunk eye.

Her daddy trumps me with this, because her first word was dadda which is something he will hold onto and torment me about forever!

I know Voguey didn’t play favourites but her daddy is claiming it’s 2-1 in his favour - he got first word and a shared love of the stank eye and I got the dimples.

Her first heartbreak was loosing Big Nan this was tough for all of us, we decided that an annual trip away was needed and New Zealand was calling us.

Our family shared 3 trips to New Zealand each Christmas, due to Covid we missed last year, but she was our first baby to travel to NZ from a young age.

She was our little adventurer, travelling from court to court, field to field, in various locations all around NSW to support her elder siblings.

We think these travelling moments contributed to her being quite worldly, she became very social, very confident and loved to meet and greet new people and usually with the biggest hug.

Voguey slowly started to develop more and more independence and as most of you would know her sassy ways started to shine through. At first this was so cute. Until the bossiness combine with her sassiness and she took us on this wild ride where there was no denying that she was in charge, even through she was the baby in our family, the baby for the combined Elers tribes and the baby of our extended Sausaofai/Aoake/Pryor & Puru whanaus.

Voguey loved her time at Pop’s place, they had a special bond. She loved her time with uncle Jarrad, Tenae and Zac while being very spoilt by them.

Nanny Shell and Bee often went head to head with being Vogue’s bestie. Vogue spent so much time with them both either when babysitting so we could go to work, trips to the park, on the sporting sidelines, they’ve shared many taxis and Ubers and more recently with her dancing endeavour. Vogue loved watching shows and movies with Nanny Shell and especially her scrambled eggs and loved the adventures and cooking experiments with Bee.

Almost 1 year to this day we farewelled our King, our Pop. Voguey struggled with this and always asked to visit Nan and Pop at their grave, today my baby will be laid to rest right next to the two that helped shaped my life and my families empire that we have built.

Her spirit filled again with her love for our dog Aroha. She adored her and annoyed her all at the same time.

Vogue looked up to her siblings and they were smitten by her. She charmed then to get their attention and once she had it, she would move on to the next sibling - simply to remind them who’s boss. Voguey and Jojo were peas in a pod they fought hard like all siblings but loved one and other just as hard.

Voguey and Ellazae shared their love for their tom-boy ways in recent times Voguey really admired Ellazae and yearned for her attention.

Voguey and Acacia were so similar. Not only did they share the sassiness and at times cheeky attitude but Voguey was a spitting image of her big sister.

Voguey and Mana shared the closest of bonds even with 11 years between them. He was playful and gentle but she loved when he tormented her and simply had his undivided attention.

As a family of 7, we have experienced so much. We are so incredibly busy so that our babies experience all life has to give. We love hard, we have our set ways, our close-knit family always have each other’s backs. Everything we do or have done was a one-in-all-in scenario. Our babies have taught us so much as parents and to repay them we always promised them that our foundation is strong and our Unit is un-breakable. Hence, we developed our own family label of EUNIT.

To our beautiful Voguey,

The most gorgeous Aboriginal and Māori baby girl, born and raised on Awabakal lands, who loved her cultures and spoke about them fondly.

-We will miss kissing your beautiful brown skin
-We will miss those divine dimples and smile
-We will miss your vibrant ways
-We will miss your gorgeous nature and big generous heart
-We will miss your cuddles, playing with your hair and your ears
-We will miss your pout before smile trademark
-We will miss your sassiness, TikToks and singing/dancing
-We will miss hearing your little voice saying “daddy’s home” and “mummy, daddy’s here”
-We will miss hearing you talk about Spider-Man, The Rock, Kalyn Ponga and Brian Tōtō
-Daddy will miss smelling your feet and you both cracking up laughing about it and doing this over and over
-Mummy will miss your dominate ways, fiery attitude but this was always followed by the most gentle hug, soft touch or a juju lips kiss.

You are one of a kind, you have touched so many lives baby girl you will forever and always be entwined in everyone’s hearts but most of all we are so grateful and blessed for the love you gave to us each and every day. Voguey adores her siblings beyond words, we are blessed to be her parents and as much as she looked up to us it was Voguey’s pure love that brought so much joy and happiness into our lives.

✨Rest easy Baby Girl✨

💜Fly high and free through the Dreamtime and safe journey on to Hawaiki💜

✨Shine Bright our Princess, guide our family for the rest of our days until we meet again✨

💜Love You Our Baby Girl💜

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💜🌻In Loving Memory Of
Vogue 'Voguey' Te Manawa Elers🌻💜

Sunrise 23rd March 2017, Sunset 1st June 2021

Service held on Saturday 5th June 2021
At The Chapel, Mayfield West

We love you past the moon 🌕 and miss you beyond the stars ✨