Obituary of Margaret Parkin

PARKIN ~ Margaret Beatrice Parkin passed away peacefully in the Dr. Cooke Extended Care Centre, Lloydminster, Alberta on Sunday, December 5, 2010 at the age of 82 years. Margaret will be sadly missed by her husband George; daughter Diane and Jim Warren; son Darcy and Kathy Parkin; four grandchildren: Christopher, Jonathan, Katelyn, Logan as well as several other relatives. The funeral service was conducted from the Grace United Church, Lloydminster, Alberta on Friday, December 10, 2010 at 10:00 A.M. with Reverend Anne McGrath officiating. The eulogy was read by Lawrence Davidson. The hymns sung were “This Is My Father’s World” and “Will Your Anchor Hold” accompanied on the organ by Irene Knowlson and the piano by Myrna Peregrym. The Grace United Church Choir was in attendance singing “Here I Am Lord” and “The Servant Song”. The honorary pallbearers were All Those Who Shared In Mum’s Life. The active pallbearers were Raymond Parkin, Michael Parkin, Stuart Parkin, Christian Emsland, Doug Simpson and Chris Warren. The interment was held in the Kitscoty Cemetery. McCaw Funeral Service Ltd., of Lloydminster, Alberta administered the funeral arrangements. EULOGY Welcome to the celebration of life of our loving wife, mum, and nana, Margaret Beatrice Parkin. It means so much to all of us to have each and every one of you here with us today as we reminisce and sing mum’s favorite hymns and enjoy some of her favorite pieces of music. And, without a doubt, she will be singing right along from her new home in her lovely alto voice! Margaret was born on August 20, 1928, in North Battleford, Saskatchewan to her English parents, Alfred Frank and Millie Louisa Long (nee Musselwhite). She was the fifth of six children and unfortunately was predeceased by all her siblings, sisters Irene, Jean and Agnes and her brothers, Alf and Les. Her dad passed away on Christmas day in 1962 and her mum on July 24, 1976. Right from the beginning, mum proved to be a bit of a tomboy-she would rather be outside playing, biking, skating and sledding than stuck inside. She would often talk about all her escapades with her best friend, Hazel McGregor, and all the hours they spent skating and biking. Up until the ripe age of 8 years old, mum faithfully attended the Salvation Army church with her family, however she decided she was tired of spending perfectly good Sunday afternoons attending Sunday School at the SA and announced to her parents that she was going to start going to the 3rd Avenue United Church where she could attend Sunday School in the morning and be able to play outside in the afternoons! In 1942 Margaret and her family moved to Lloydminster to run a bakery for the Wager brothers who had been called to serve in the war. A few years later Grandpa Long purchased the bakery and it became the ‘Long’s Bakery and Confectionary’. With the move, our mum left school, attended business school and then became the bookkeeper of the bakery for fifteen years until she married George Parkin and moved to the farm to begin a whole new learning curve being a farm wife. Luckily mum was already an “old hat” at driving as she had not only kept books at the bakery but spent many hours delivering bread. She said she knew every shortcut and back alley in Lloyd and was a pro at rush trips to the train station to catch the outgoing train with the last minute orders for bread! George and Margaret were married in the Anglican church in Kitscoty on April 10, 1957 and they settled down in a little 2 room shack on the quarter of land gifted to them by dad’s dad, Grandpa Wilfred. Life was hard and as mum put it, they rarely had 2 nickels to rub together but they had a rich life and lived off the land. There were chickens, milk cows, pigs, a big garden and no end of work. But right from the beginning they started attending the United Church in Kitscoty. Mum had been teaching Explorers and Sunday School at Grace United and singing in the choir and simply transferred to doing the same activities at Kitscoty. Besides hard work and church life, dad and mum enjoyed square dancing and traveled many miles attending dances and meeting lots of people. On March 11, 1961, their daughter Diane Margaret was born and then Darcy Wayne joined the family as their special chosen son in February, 1967. By that time dad and mum had built a bigger house on the hill as the shack became too small after Diane’s arrival. Luckily mum had the patience of Job as Darcy was quite an adventure seeker and we made numerous trips to the Emergency department for stitches yet none of the incidents seemed to phase our mum, she always remained cool and calm and often had to calm dad down. Once in a while we could convince dad to go on a family trip but the hired men soon learnt that when we went on a two week trip we would be home in 10 days or less because once dad had the vehicle pointed east it was straight home we went no matter what mum said. Another important part of mum’s life was visiting back and forth with neighbors. In those days it was nothing to go to your neighbors around 8 o’clock at night to visit and sometimes play cards, crib was a favorite, and nobody went home hungry from mum’s house. It was nothing to be sitting down around 11 o’clock or midnight to a full spread of toast, cheese, pickles, squares and cookies and gallons of tea! As many of you know, Margaret had a quiet but strong faith and believed in showing it in the use of time and talent in service to the Lord. This was exemplified in her service as a Sunday School teacher, superintendent, a leader for various lengths of time for CGIT, Explorers, and Messengers, not to mention the hours dedicated to U.C.W., St. Paul Presbyterial, St. Paul Presbytery, Camp Whitney, Church Conference and U.C.W. Church Conference. She even lead Junior Choir for awhile and always encouraged children and adults alike to share and use their musical talents. Her greatest love was singing and being in the choir and she had a lovely strong alto voice. As kids, Darcy and Diane both remember that with mum it was a case of we must get to church, rain, shine or high snow drifts and yes we did get stuck numerous time on Johnston’s hill trying to get to church!! Mum was a “recycler” too and this fit right in with the church life as well. She was constantly collecting used stamps, used eyeglasses and Campbell soup labels for church mission projects and her hands were rarely idle as she was forever either crocheting a new lap robe, knitting a pair of socks or mittens, or knitting a new baby outfit. If she wasn’t doing that, she would be baking or cooking something to take to the church. In mum’s books it would never do to have idle hands and if she felt like sitting you could still count on the washing machine and/or the dishwasher busy running doing some of the work. Margaret always took interest in people and what they were doing, especially her grandchildren. She made herself well versed in a lot of different things, from sports to music, and always put other’s needs ahead of hers. As children we always appreciated that mum would sit back and let us do something on our own without interceding and she was the brave person who mostly taught both of us to drive. It must have taken a lot to sit back and let Diane decorate her first birthday cake for dad’s birthday, there was only a BIT of blue icing all over the kitchen-and then there was Darcy’s first attempt at cooking pancakes for the family-there may perhaps still be dried pancake batter somewhere in mum’s kitchen!! Decorating cakes was one skill mum learnt at the bakery and she did a beautiful job on many anniversary and wedding cakes in the community. Jim & Diane’s cake was probably the biggest challenge ever due to the extreme hot spell that hit in August 1983 where temperatures reached close to 40 degrees Celsius so here mum would be trying to get the icing to co-operate at 12 o’clock at night! Now mum basically never swore, so when you heard a few “damns” those nights you knew it was bad. Besides church life, mum made many contributions to the community in other ways. She was a member of the library board, belonged to Court Lady K Foresters, spent many years helping organize the Kitscoty Fair, and in later years was an active member of the Kitscoty Legion branch. Of course she always made sure Diane made it to her piano lessons, Darcy to his hockey games and practices, and supported both children in all their school activities and 4-H. Every year mum grew a huge garden and it fed many families besides ours. Besides gardening, mum would be called into duty to do chores, feeding up to 400 pigs, helping pick rocks, running the tractor and baler, taking fuel and meals to the field and sometimes driving truck to pick up bales. Actually our mum preferred being outside doing any of these things, so Diane learned at an early age to become adept in the kitchen providing meals, largely in self defense for the entire family. Mum was a good cook and fed many extra people including hired men, Uncle Cyril, Grandpa Herman, Uncle Frank, and anyone else who wandered in anytime remotely close to meal time but her first love was the outdoors. This was evident too in all the beautiful flowers around the yard, all the lovely trees she and dad planted during their married life, and by all the bird feeders, bird houses and hummingbird feeders hanging in the yard. Dad and mum loved watching all the birds come and go and squabble over food and especially enjoyed the hummingbirds who came every year in numerous quantities. Basically mum loved animals and nature in general, over the years she had many cats and dogs, including her Tippy dog who spent many hours riding in the tractor cab where she was baling. Yes, mum was very much a caregiver in her time and we also often called her the equivalent of the “United Nations” in settling family disputes and arguments. But whatever fell to mum she was willing to do it and did it without complaint, looking after Great-Grandma Parkin, Ben Lenz, Uncle Cyril, Great-Grandpa Herman Lenz, and her own mum, Millie. That’s probably why a good laugh was also important to her and she enjoyed all forms of comedy, Red Skelton, Wayne & Shuster, George Burns, Carol Burnett and the Muppets, just to name a few. She also loved watching football and a few weeks ago actually got annoyed at a nurse standing between her and the TV screen showing the Eskimos football game! Unfortunately, our parents waited too long to retire and start realizing all their dreams of traveling but they did have some enjoyable times before their health deteriorated. A coach trip of the Maritimes was much enjoyed by both, but mum said if she ever saw the inside of a museum again it would be too soon! Perhaps the best thing was their purchase of a fifth wheel trailer and they enjoyed many camping trips with family, the grandkids, and especially with Frank and Hazel. Mum’s favorite places were both close to home, Camp Whitney and Cold Lake, so at least they didn’t have far to travel. Probably mum’s biggest disappointment was when she had to go on oxygen and could no longer sit by a campfire or even put candles on the birthday cakes! The long and short of it is we can never summarize mum’s rich and full life of 82 years in a few pages and we know each and everyone of you will have your own special memories of mum. To the very end we are sure mum kept these words of the U.C.W. motto close to her heart: “To unite women of the congregation for the total mission of the church and to provide a medium through which we may express our loyalty to Jesus Christ in Christian Witness, Study, Fellowship and Service.” And surely no truer words could apply to Margaret than these words from the Musician’s Prayer: “May my life be like a finely tuned instrument upon which the Master musician creates a melody that brings His peace to all that may hear.” Rest well our beloved wife, mum and nana, and we all know you will have the kettle on to make a nice cuppa tea when anyone comes to visit you... CARD OF THANKS The family of Margaret Parkin wish to extend their heartfelt thanks to so many who took care of our beloved wife, mum and nana and to those who took part in the ‘celebration of her life’. We extend so much gratitude to the caring staff at the Dr. Cooke who especially kept mum comfortable in her last days in palliative care and many thanks to Dr. Snyman for her care and encouragement. A very special thanks to Rev. Anne McGrath for such a beautiful service and to Irene Knowlson, Myrna Peregrym, Gladys Jack and the Grace choir for their wonderful contributions of music. To Lawrence Davidson, a special friend, thank you for the meaningful scripture readings and reading of the eulogy. We are ever thankful to the pallbearers who agreed to serve without a moment’s hesitation and to Colleen Hozack for catering such an awesome lunch. Simple words cannot express our many thanks to all who sent cards, flowers, made donations, phoned and brought food to the Warren house. Last, but not least, we sincerely thank Glenn McCaw and his staff for their caring and professional handling of all the big and little details. We will miss her but are secure in the knowledge she is in a heavenly place. God Bless all. Sincerely, George; Jim, Diane & Chris; Darcy, Kathy, Jonathan, Katelyn & Logan. Donations in memory of Margaret may be made to the Canadian Diabetic Association or to a charity of the donors choice.