Miranda Leighanne Hollowell

Some people leave this world, but they leave pieces of themselves everywhere. In the memories we can’t stop replaying, in the stories we’ll tell for the rest of our lives, in the laughter that catches us off guard, and in the moments when we wish more than anything that we could pick up the phone and hear their voice one more time.

Miranda Leighanne Hollowell was one of those.

Born on June 27, 1984, she was a woman who loved in her own way, lived life on her own terms, and made time for the people who mattered most to her. She didn’t need a special occasion to show up for family, and she didn’t need a reason to spend time with the people she loved. Family was part of who she was. No matter what life threw her way, the people closest to her held a special place in her heart.

She loved to fish, and anyone who knew her could understand the simple happiness of being out by the water, enjoying the moment and doing something she loved. She enjoyed smoking weed, too, and she was unapologetically herself. She wasn’t here to be anybody else, and that is part of what made her who she was. Life isn’t about being perfect. It’s about being real, making memories, loving your people, and leaving behind something that matters. She did that in ways that will live on long after her passing.

Above all, her family was important to her. She leaves behind her two beloved sons, Jesse Johnson and his wife Makayla and Mason Johnson, who will forever carry a part of her with them. She was also a proud grandmother to Waylon Johnson, her only grandson, who will have a lifetime of love and family stories to connect him to her memory.

She leaves behind five nieces, three nephews, and her sister, Amanda Weatherford, who will forever hold the memories, the love, the arguments, the laughter, and all the little pieces of life they shared. Some bonds go beyond words, and the bond between sisters is one of them. A sister isn’t just someone you grow up with. She’s part of your history, part of your heart, and part of the person you become. Losing that bond leaves a space that nobody else can fill.

She was preceded in death by her beloved grandmother, Phyllis Burkheart, whom she now joins in eternal rest.

Her passing leaves behind a pain that words can never fully explain. There will be moments when the world keeps moving, even though the people who love her feel like theirs has stopped. There will be birthdays, family gatherings, fishing trips, and ordinary days when her absence hits all over again. There will be stories told about her, some that bring tears, some that bring laughter, and probably a few that make everybody shake their heads and say, “That was just her.”

Those stories matter. They are how we keep someone close when we can no longer hold them. They are how her sons will remember their mother, how her grandson will learn about his grandmother, how her nieces and nephews will carry her memory forward and how her sister will continue to hold on to a bond that death cannot erase.

Grief is the price we pay for loving someone who mattered, and she mattered. She mattered as a daughter, a mother, a grandmother, an aunt, and as a sister. She mattered in the little everyday moments just as much as in the big ones. Her life was more than the day she was born and the day she died. It was every moment in between, every person she loved, every memory she made, and every piece of herself she left behind

She was loved in life, she will be missed beyond words, and she will never be forgotten.

May she rest peacefully, with no more pain, no more struggles, and all the peace this world couldn’t always give her. May there always be a little piece of her in the water on a quiet fishing day, in the laughter of her family, and in the memories that never fade.

Until we meet again, you will always be part of us. Forever loved. Forever missed. Forever our family.

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