Evelyn Mabyn Phelps Burnham

EVELYN MABYN PHELPS BURNHAM Funeral services for Evelyn Mabyn Phelps Burnham will be held at 1 p.m. on Saturday, September 28 at the Mancos Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Burial will follow at Cedar Grove Cemetery. Visitation has been set for Saturday morning at 10:30 a.m. at the L.D.S. Church. Evelyn Mabyn Phelps Burnham, beloved wife of Ben Franklin Burnham, was born April 27, 1929, in Mancos, Colo., in her grandmother's home as a loved child of Francis Armstrong and William B. Hartmaan. She grew up loving and loved by her older brother Robert, and eight younger siblings, McKinley (Red), Laura, Roland, Bonnie, Dorothy, Frank, Anna and Fred Phelps, children of Frances and McKinley Phelps. Evelyn died on Thursday, September 19, 2013, in her home, held in love by family and friends. Evelyn married Ben Franklin Burnham on November 2, 1947, in Mancos, Colo. They have eight children: Gary, David, Virginia, Deena, Andrea, Alan, Garland and Vicki, who gave her a heart's desire to have many grandchildren. She has 33 grandchildren, 42 great-grandchildren and a countless number of honorary grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She counted her riches in these children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren and often said they were the jewels in her crown. Evelyn Mabyn Burnham loved her family and delighted in the birth or addition of each grandchild and great-grandchild. She loved to garden and spent many hours each day tending to her vegetable and flower gardens and to her fruit trees and bushes. The green beans she canned throughout the years cannot be counted. She was an accomplished home artist as defined by her quilts, doilies, oil paintings, baby blankets, clothes, numberless loaves of homemade bread and pies, jars upon jars of home canned fruits, vegetables and jams as a small sampling of her many talents. Evelyn's talents were not a hobby but a necessity for a woman of one of the greatest generations and she took pride in passing them on to the next generations. Her love and service to her to church and community will long be remembered and missed by the many she has touched. Her family loves her and will miss her beautiful smile. We will miss her.