Anna King’s mother was Jill, a school teacher and mother of 2 boys, Patrick and Alex, and wife to Steve. Bringing a girl into the family fold was a welcome addition. Anna was well aware she was the only daughter too, she was a smart cookie you see!

Anna loved birthday’s, in fact she loved any occassion where food would be in abundance and the possibility of her getting a handout was a sure thing. She also loved to be in the middle of the action. Anna wasn’t shy about coming up to you while you were in the process of opening a package and start sniffing it, in hopes of figuring out what it was. She was truly interested and figured she had just as much right to be in the middle of the party as the next person! In this photo she is checking out her youngest brother, Alex’s packages.

On occassion the wild animal in Anna King became unleased, and unable to control herself Anna would attack, rip and tear the wrapping paper and work herself into a frenzy as seen here in this still footage photo of Anna King The Beast! Note the wild red eyes!

As mentioned earlier Anna was all about food, and if it was a handout that was even better. She was not too proud to stand directly beside you at the diinner table and stare you straight in the eye. Leave a piece of pie unattended as our son Matt did once and Anna would walk up to it and inhale it faster than you could say “Anna, don’t….”! Yes, this only daughter of Steve and Jill’s had an appetite like a son!

Anna could also be cute, and do cute things. One of those was in true girl fashion. She liked to lay down beside her food and eat. I’m sure if she had a chaise lounge that would have suited her just fine too. Nothing was too good for this girl!

Over the years Steve and Jill had family photos taken with Patrick, Alex and Anna. Anna wasn’t always so sure about being in these photos. Sometimes she’d be real patient, other times not so much.

It could take several tries before they would end up with a decent photo that they could send out with the Christmas cards.

At least Anna kept it fun and entertaining. In this photo our son Matt is taking the photo for Steve and Jill and I am capturing what went down. As you can see from just this one photo Anna wasn’t having anything to do with it at one point!

This is the family portrait used for this year, 2009, sent out with their Christmas cards. Anna’s last year with the family.

You will be missed dear friend. We hope you are with Grandma Bennet now, and enjoying a good visit. It was a real pleasure knowing you. We are certainly better for it, and hope you realize how much you meant to us. See you later girl. Love you.

It’s always sad to talk about those we love who have passed away, whether recent or further back in time. It is within this framework of emotions that I want to express my grief over the passing of a family member, John Laxalt. John and his wonderful wife Candy were high school classmates of mine, both graduating in 1972, a year after me. They were both involved in school activities, John on the varsity basketball team, Candy a cheerleader or the “pep squad” as they called it back in the day.

John and Candy were a couple back in high school, as shown here in a photo taken from my 1971 graduating year book. Their photos filled the pages showing them in various school activities. I never really got to know them during the high school years. It wasn’t until my father in law Vern, married Candy’s mother, Jackie, that we became related and began to see and have a chance to get to know each other. In the last 6-8 years, approximately, Candy and I have had the unfortunate event of having even more in common, when she was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia. Candy has struggled for so long with the debilitating symptoms of this disease. And then the devastating news that John had cancer.

It just doesn’t seem fair sometimes, all the stuff that is thrown at us in life. It feels as if too much tragedy happens to those who don’t deserve it, and the ones that are careless in life skate through it with nary a scratch or personal hardship. Maybe karma will catch up to them. Who knows. All I know is I wish peace for John. And for Candy, I hope somehow she will be able to find comfort in knowing family is there for her, whenever.