Obituary
Elsie was born in Galahad, AB, on the initial family farm. Her family moved to farmland at Killam, AB, and eventually onto a farm in the Kavanaugh/Millet area. She spent her childhood/teen years helping her father and mother run the family farm alongside her sister and brothers. She attended Faith Temple where she met Ervin and married him on her twenty-first birthday in 1960. Together they raised four children.
Elsie’s passions were two things: people and cleaning. Wherever she went in life Elsie always made friends. She loved to hear others’ stories and always had a tale or two of her own to share.
One of her first jobs off the farm was to care for others. She was a dietician at an Edmonton hospital. When she and Ervin started their life together, she worked as a nursing aide at a senior’s home in Ponoka, AB. She made her career through custodial work. First started out by cleaning schools in Fort McMurray, but as she was a natural leader, she was soon supervising the cleaning of the Fort McMurray school district. Eventually, she would run her own cleaning business, cleaning office buildings and workshops in the city of Calgary. Her life with Ervin took her to many places throughout Alberta and for a time to Delta, BC. Elsie and Ervin were not afraid to move. Going where life and work called them to be….to a total of ten different towns and cities in their 62 years together. In their retirement, they chose to settle in the Okanagan, Kelowna BC.
Besides a successful career outside the home, Elsie was a natural homemaker. She always had a substantial vegetable garden and beautiful flower gardens surrounding her homes. She canned and froze the harvest each year. Her cold room, a staple in each home, was never empty but rather filled with pickled cucumber, carrots, beets, Christmas pudding, pears, peaches, and cherries. She made many fabulous meals and desserts and baked fresh bread and buns year in and out. She crocheted for many; giving baby clothes, receiving blankets, crocheted doilies, and tablecloths, as well as eventually moving on to knitted blankets to decorate her children’s bedrooms. (at least Rhonda’s) Her hands were never still, and her family and friends benefited tremendously as a result. Aside from caring for her own family – when Fort McMurray was home – she was a caregiver for at-risk youth, she and Ervin took in foster children giving them a landing place while their futures were decided. She was Aunty Elsie to many.
Elsie was a woman led and supported by faith. It was the invaluable cornerstone of who she was in this world.
She will be remembered by her husband Ervin, daughter Debbie, and granddaughters Cassandra and Marina. Daughters Crystal (Richard) and Rhonda (Randy). Son Brad (Rachel) and grandsons Eric and Ethan. Sister Ella (Dale), Brothers: Don (Bev), David (Donna), and Ernie (Dolly) as well as many nephews, nieces, and their families.
She was predeceased by her parents Arthur and Hilda Schaber, her brother Edward and Ervin’s parents Joe and Yvonne McKenzie, and her brother-in-law Max.
A memorial for Elsie will be held at a later time.
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Our most sincere sympathies to the family and friends of Elsie Mary McKenzie November 2 1939

August 20 2022..

everden rust funeral services & cremation

Death notice for the town of: Kelowna, Province: Colombie britanique

death notice Elsie Mary McKenzie November 2 1939

August 20 2022

mortuary notice Elsie Mary McKenzie November 2 1939

August 20 2022