September – October & GGMA Celebration of Life

The passing of GGMA was very sad for the whole family, however we all knew that she was ready to go and to move on to the next stage of her journey. Thankfully the majority of everyone’s memories of GGMA are happy memories of a life well lived and many happy times.

But the work began while she was still in “Trinity”, as Dr. M. suggested we could clean her suite out at The Shores. Well the four of us (Dean, Judy, Brenda, Larry) started cleaning cupboards, moving out furniture, moving boxes of stuff to the thrift store, sharing treasured gifts among family members and in a few short days we had the place emptied.

Then of course after GGMA passed away the real paperwork began. Funeral home planning, death certificates, burial site planning, headstone design, funeral preparations, interment planning, tax documents, bank forms, Interior Health documents, wills and estate requirements; you get the idea. So much paperwork and so much to do that pretty well ate up the month of September and most of October.

Somewhere in all this mayhem we picked a date and location for a Celebration of Life for GGMA. We chose October 28th at Kamloops Funeral Home for the formal funeral service; which was followed by a luncheon for all.
Then later that night a Celebration with family and close friends was held at Frick & Frack Restaurant. Out of towners’ from Brenda’s family were her cousin Coleen from Ontario and her daughter Bonnie from Vancouver plus long time family friend Jayne from Calgary. From my side there was my sisters Maureen from Vancouver and Donna from Ladysmith on the Island. Tricia who was the official photographer for the evening. What a great evening to get family and extended family together for a Celebration.
One of the few times all the cousins have been together.

We have often reminisced that the ones who would have enjoyed themselves the most at this family gathering were the couple that we were holding this Celebration of Life for. Both Joan and Murray would have had the most fun of the evening watching the family and just smiling at what they were a part of creating.