Thursday, March 28, 2024

Jacquelene "Jacquie" (de Jong, West) Cox

January 11, 1929 - July 27, 2019

Posted

Jacquelene "Jacquie" (de Jong West) Cox, age 90, died at home, July 27, 2019 after a long and glorious life.  Mom always did things HER way and even wrote her own obituary:  I left today for The Big Rock Candy Mountain.  I've been everywhere man, I've been everywhere!  From Canada to Mexico, from West coast to East coast, from sea to shining sea!  Oh, the wonders I have seen: Sunsets in Hawaii and the ice of the North Pole, The Olympic Peninsula, Mount Rushmore, The Flaming Gorge, Plymouth Rock, Niagara Falls, Pensacola Bay, and the sunrise over the Florida Keys.

I started my journey January 11, 1929 in Ellensburg, Washington. The oldest child and only daughter of Abram Cornelius de Jong and Freda Isabelle Shull.  My grandparents were Cornelis Pieter Johannes Hoogerwerf von Griffenwerf and Aukjen de Jong, immigrants from Holland, and Charles Edward Shull and Minnie Mae Newman, early pioneers to the Kittitas valley.

I leave behind my greatest accomplishments: my ten children and their families.  Larry (Bunny) West, Jerry West, Terry (deceased) West, Becky (Dana) Takashima, Chris, Sam, Jackie, Chip (Janet) West, Willie West and Marnie (Greg) McMillan along with 20 grandkids and 18 great grandkids.

I want to thank you, each and every one, for the cards and letters, the phone calls, emails, personal visits long or short.  Thank you for all your loving gifts, washers, dryers, cash, cars, all the flowers real and fake in my windows and vases.  Thank you for all the pictures in albums and on the walls, for the serger that put more fun in all the sewing I loved to do, and all good thoughts and deeds, I cherish them all.

I especially THANK YOU for all the sacrifices you made so I could go to school to be a better nurse and for letting me stay in the house on the hill to enjoy the view of the mountains I love so much.

Thank you for all the celebrations, parties, birthdays, weddings, Christmases, Easters, Westivals and FISH CAMPS!  Thank you for the trips we shared near and far, from The Red Apple to Costco to The Vermont Country Store. WOW, WHAT A LIFE!  WHAT FUN I'VE HAD!

On this next new adventure, maybe I will run into my son Terry West or my brother John de Jong.  Maybe I will run into my old flames Bob West and Bill Cox. Maybe NOT.

REMEMBER THE GOOD TIMES we shared and the fantastic places we've seen.

I've left my worldly mark; you can view it in the Ellensburg IOOF cemetery.

A Celebration of Life will be held August 10, 2019 1-3 p.m., 9703 North Road, Peshastin.