Funeral

Why in the world is the word fun in FUNeral? It was definitely not fun, but it was really nice. William's funeral was held on Saturday, January 19th at the LDS Church in Santa Barbara.  We made two large poster board collages filled with pictures of William as a baby, boy, teenager and adult. The front podium has a few different pictures, flowers and his remains.

Preston Mann, good family friend, conducted the service.  He started it by acknowledging the sacrifices that many had made to attend the service that day.  "But for those that know Julie, they know she made the ultimate sacrifice by getting up at 10am to be here..."  Everyone laughed at this remark.

The program included several cousins who shared childhood memories of William, a talk by George Thompson, myself and Scott. As a special musical number, we had a recording of Travis Stehmeier singing "Bring Him Home" from Les Miserables, and I was able to accompany it with Sign Language.

There were over 70 family and friends from all over that made it down to Santa Barbara to attend the service for William.  It was a real moving, touching dedication to his life and a joyful reunion with many family members that we had not seen for a while. 

After the service, the ward held a luncheon for the members of the family that attended.  We were able to get some fun family photos with everyone.  Here is my mom with a cousin, Jeremiah, who had driven down from San Francisco and didn't tell us that he was coming.  So it was a big surprise!!!

 

We were surprised to have all of my cousins (the Gray Girls) attend.  Three of them had shared childhood memories of William and brought a sweet spirit to the tribute.

 

Glenn, Marsha's husband, decided to be the honorary pallbearer and carry William's remains from the luncheon to the car.

Here I am with a childhood friend, Lisa, who made the trip and it was nice to see her again.

And, of course, I was especially surprised to have my husband and boys join me all the way from Salt Lake City.  They had not told me that they were going to be driving in, and so it was fun to see them when they pulled in the day before.

 

Jeana wins the award for having traveled the farthest, since she flew all the way in from Alaska to be there for the service and support my mom.

 



We again would like to express our sincerest appreciation for the love and support that we received from everyone during this difficult time.