My Aunt Dot

Today is my Grampie's birthday. He is super young at just 71. I was born less than three weeks before his 37th birthday  - so you can do the math on my age. If you get anything other than 24 for an answer then you must start over cause obviously you did it wrong ;) Also can you just imagine becoming a grandparent at just 36 !!! I am so sorry Grampie ;) I blame my parents !!!

My Grampie is the tall handsome one in the middle, my Grammie is beside him in the blue.

On the left are three of my Grammie's four sisters, and on the right my Grampie's two brother-in-laws (Vernon & Dick) and his sisters Phyllis and Barb, missing is my Grampie's only brother (Bob) and his brother-in-law Jim (Aunt Dot's husband ).... ok and the brother-in-law right beside my Grampie is also my Grammie's first cuz .... don't get confused now ... we are from the country ! 

You see my Grampie and his siblings lost their oldest sister last week. My Great Aunt Dot. She's in the middle between my Mom's cousin Beth (left) and my Mom (right).

It's so amazing the way our memories work. The ones that flood back to you after someone passes on. The stocking she knit for me with my name on it. The Jones family reunions. The weekend visits to her house when we were growing up. The way she spoiled everyone with so much love. She never ever forgot my birthday, my children's birthday, my husbands birthday or any other family members birthday ever! That's who she was. She was love, she was kind, she was patient, she was thoughtfulness, she was what I saw of her ~ selflessness. She served beside her minister husband for 57 years. She was an example of how to live and love God. I can still hear her voice. I remember her not of someone who was sick at the end but I see her when she was healthy.

Aunt Dot is right smack dab standing in the middle, white shirt ...

I bet you can't guess from the hairstyles alone what decade this was ??? :)

Jones Family Reunion ~ Gordon College, Wenham, Massachusetts, 1990. I am second row , blue t-shirt. Please don't do the math on my age now :) At the time of this picture there were 48 of us, 8 missing from this picture, not including my Great Grandparents who were already gone.

My Great Grandfather, Rev. John Jones was born in Melbourne, Australia in 1904. He sailed from his home and his family in Auckland , New Zealand  in 1923 to come to Canada to attend McGill University when he was just 19 years old. Canada was where he met my Great Grandmother Bessie and Canada was where they stayed. They had five children. So because they had Dorothy (Aunt Dot), Barbara (Aunt Barb), Phyllis (Aunt Phil ), John (my Grampie), and Robert (Uncle Bob), there are now 92 of us. Most of us don't even have the last name Jones but whether married in or the babies born of those marriages - we are:

The Jones Family.

My Great Aunt Dot 1933-2012

Matthew 25:21