Cheryl grew up moving frequently because her dad, James Harold Nordin "Jim", was a radar technician.  He worked on radar installations at airports, all around the United States.  Jim grew up in Arkansas.  Her mother, Carole Frances Van de Velde Nordin, grew up in California.  Cheryl was born when Carole was 20 and James was 23.  Her brother, James Arthur Nordin "Jimmy", was born 5 years later.  Cheryl was cute and sweet, and remained that way throughout her life. She was the first grandchild to Carole's parents, Elvira Van de Velde "Vi" and Arthur Van de Velde "Pop Pop."  Jim's parents were Thelma Nordin Israel and James Israel "Poppa Jim."

Within a year of her parent's marriage, Cheryl was born in Fullerton, California, where Jim was going to college.  Jim took a lot of classes, but didn't finish his degree.  After college, Jim had the choice between moving to Miami or Little Rock, and since Jim had roots in Arkansas, that's where they chose.  Carole and Jim found the Lord during their time in Little Rock.  They later moved to Michigan where Jim worked in electronics as a technical writer.  Jimmy was born in Mount Clemens, Michigan.  They moved back to California for Jim's work when Cheryl and Jimmy were young.

When Cheryl was in grammar school, she befriended a little classmate with Downs syndrome. Cheryl became her best friend. The little classmate’s mother was so thankful that her daughter had found someone so kind and true. That was the tone throughout Cheryl’s life, filling the need wherever she went. That led her to choose nursing as her profession. Her teacher in high school said she should pursue being a doctor, because her mind was that sharp. But Cheryl settled on pediatric nurse. 

Cheryl had fond memories of summers spent staying with her grandparents in Orange County, CA.  Grandma Vi and Pop Pop had a house in Costa Mesa and a cabin by the beach in the Bayshore Trailer Park in Newport Beach.  She had a really special relationship with her grandparents.

For a time, Jim and Carole lived in Ventura, CA.  Cheryl loved her little short haired black and white dog, Pepper, possibly a terrier.  She always remembered how her dog got out the back gate and got hit by a car.  She loved Pepper fiercely.  Cheryl started high school while they lived in Ventura.

Jim and Carole bought a house in Carpenteria, CA, where Cheryl graduated high school.

Cheryl would tells stories about the days when she wasn't allowed to wear pants to school.  All the girls had to wear dresses.  She wasn't allowed to watch The Monkees TV show because the actors had long hair, which was thought to be against God at the time.

After high school, Cheryl went to a 3 year nursing school program at USC School of Nursing in Los Angeles.  She would tell stories about how she and her friends would drive around the city and purposefully get themselves lost, to have a fun challenge finding their way home.

Cheryl met Arthur Daniel Ower "Artie" when she visited Bethany Church of Alhambra a few times while she was in nursing school.  It was at a college snow retreat with the church where they hit it off.  Some weekends she would drive to visit her parents in Santa Barbara and go to church there.  Cheryl admired Artie's faithfulness in driving the church bus.  One Sunday night, a group of 10-15 went out to coffee and dinner after evening service.  Artie had his pick up truck with just one bench seat, but 3 of them were going to fit into the truck.  Cheryl scooted over to make room, but the third person never came.  Cheryl didn't scoot back over and stayed in the middle.  They began dating shortly after and they dated about a year and a half to two years.  One thing Cheryl always remembered was how she liked when Artie would go play with his nieces and nephews when they were at family gatherings during the early years.

Cheryl completed her nursing program in 1975 and worked in pediatrics for her entire nursing career, working in several hospitals and doctor's offices.

Artie and Cheryl were married April 9, 1976 at Bethany Church of Alhambra.  Cheryl was 21 and Artie was 23.  They really enjoyed this season of life.  They had lots of close relationships with friends from church and nursing school.

Artie and Cheryl had two children, Rebecca Ann "Becky" 1979 and David Daniel 1983, both born at Garfield Hospital, and both on August 25th.  Rebecca was born while they lived in a rental house in Monrovia.  When Rebecca was a year old, Artie's work moved them to Santa Rosa in Northern California.  Cheryl worked in a pediatrician's office there.  They lived in Santa Barbara for a few months before moving back to the Los Angeles area, again for Artie's work.  David was born while they lived in a rental house in Glendora.

Artie and Cheryl bought a 3 bedroom mobile home, in a community called Peachwood, in Pomona, CA, where they lived for 10 years.  While there, Cheryl worked part time as a nurse and spent the rest of her time raising her kids, doing crafts, and spending time with friends.  She and Artie were very active at Covina Assembly of God during these years.  Artie was a sound and light technician for the church and Cheryl was a part of women's ministries and craft groups.  Cheryl loved to go out to eat at Sizzler almost every Sunday after church.  She loved to order the hibachi chicken and salad bar.

Camping at Campland in San Diego was a favorite summer getaway.  Artie and Cheryl would often borrow Grandpa Jim's motorhome and meet up with their good friends and family at Campland for two weeks at a time.  Alan and Janie Ower and their three kids would always go and different people from church would come over the years.  They spent a lot of time in the Campland pool playing with all the kids.  One year, Tim Ower brought two catamarans and everyone had fun boating.  From the boat you could see penguins from SeaWorld, which was a thrill for everyone.

After the birth of David, Cheryl began to have significant problems with her blood sugar levels being too low and interfering with the quality of her life.  Around 1993, Cheryl's mother passed away.  Around the same time, Cheryl's liver began to have problems.

Feeling a calling from God, and to be closer to Cheryl's father and only aunt, Artie and Cheryl moved to Hanford in Central CA.  They moved in with her aunt and uncle, Darlene "Dar" and Darrell Parr.  For the first year, Artie stayed in Los Angeles to try to sell their Peachwood home and he would come to Hanford on the weekends.  Cheryl first worked as a pediatric surgery recovery nurse for oral surgeries to be able to work, but not be exposed to germs, to protect her weakened immune system.  Artie and Cheryl were active at Koinonia Church in Hanford.  Rebecca finished her junior and senior year of high school in Hanford and then went to Vanguard University of Southern CA.  David started 7th grade in Hanford.  After high school, David joined the navy for four years.  At that time, Cheryl worked at the Fresno Children's Hospital with children who were sedated for brain scans, typically autistic children.  Some of her co-workers became very good friends.

Artie and Cheryl lived in an apartment in Edgewater, in Handford, after moving out of Aunt Dar and Uncle Darrell's house.

In 2000, Cheryl Ower had a liver transplant in San Francisco.  Artie stayed through the surgery and the first few days, but had to return to work.  Rebecca stayed with her for the first week, Aunt Dar stayed the next week, and Wendy Michaels stayed the final week and brought her home.  The transplant went well and gave her many more years of life.

Cheryl recovered well from the liver transplant and found that her blood sugar problems had improved as well.  She found it ironic that suddenly she could eat all the treats she wanted without consequence, while Artie had recently been diagnosed with diabetes and could not. She began working again.

Cheryl was always happiest with a dog to love.  Rusty was the first dog Artie and Cheryl had together, a lively golden retriever.  Rusty was so patient and good with the kids.  Becky used to give her pet mouse, Jonah, rides on Rusty's back.  Rusty loved to escape and run free through the neighborhood every chance he got.  He was so fun to play fetch with.  Anything could become his fetch toy, a stick, a ball, or whatever you could find.  

After Rusty passed, Cheryl adopted Sparky, her mom's sweet dog.  Sparky came from trauma.  He started following Carole around on her morning runs in the neighborhood.  Eventually, Sparky became Carole and Jim's dog.  Once Carole passed, Cheryl brought Sparky home.  He was so cute and he had two circles on the top of his head that made it look like he always had a pair of sunglasses sitting there.

Once, at Becky and David's elementary school, there was a large dog running all around.  The kids begged to take the dog home.  Cheryl said that if the dog jumped in the car, they would take the dog home.  The dog happily jumped into the car and the work began to tame the savage, but happy, beast.  The dog was too strong for the kids or Cheryl to be able to walk the dog, so Cheryl had to find a better suited home for him.

Alan and Janie Ower's dog had a litter of terrier puppies, and again, the kids begged to take the puppies home.  Cheryl agreed to take two of them home.  Rocky and Angel were adorable and a handfull.  Cheryl and the kids enjoyed them so much.  Becky sewed a diaper for the dogs, thinking that was a good idea.  Thankfully, the dogs never filled the diaper.

At one point, a neighbor's cat had a litter of kittens, but the mama cat got hit by a car.  Without hesitation, Cheryl took the kittens home.  The kids did the day shift of bottle feeding the kittens, and Cheryl took the night shift, waking up throughout the night to feed the babies.  Cheryl kept two of the cats, one for each kid, and rehomed the others.  Mitsy, short for mittens and Blackie were very loved family pets.

Squeakers found us as a pregnant feral kitty in Pomona.  Cheryl had to crawl under the house to rescue the newborn kittens and brought them and the mama cat into the house, giving them a safe place to live.  Eventually, new homes were found when the kittens were old enough, but Squeakers was adopted and made part of the family.  Squeakers remained a bit skittish.  In their later years in Hanford, Mitsy and Squeakers did not get along.  Cheryl had to give each cat their turn in the main part of the house. Cheryl's patience with animals was amazing.  Her love for them was unending.

Cheryl was so tender hearted for animals.  If an animal needed a home, she was quick to volunteer.  She adopted her daughter's mother-in-law's dachshund dog Beavis.  He lived out his old doggy life being loved by Cheryl.  Years later, Cheryl adopted her son's dachshund dog Daisy.  Daisy was spoiled rotten and Cheryl loved it that way.  She would make Daisy her own fried egg in the morning if Cheryl was eating eggs.  Every morning she would hold her mug down to Daisy so the dog could lick out the mocha left in her mug.  Daisy was always by Cheryl's side.

Cheryl especially enjoyed being a grandma.  Rebecca was married to Jonathan Hartshorn and they had 3 kids: Caleb 2001, Benjamin 2006, and Ella 2015.   Grandma Cheryl was always there for every birthday party and special event for all her grandkids.  Cheryl and Artie visited often for weekend visits with Rebecca and her family.  She made sure to invest in each grandchild in special ways so they would know how loved they were.

Artie and Cheryl bought a cute house in a lovely neighborhood, just across the street from their former Edgewater apartment.  Cheryl had it painted a cheerful blue and had a cement path paved around the edge of the back yard so the grandkids could ride their toy cars and bikes around in a big continuous oval.  She had the house filled with all the things that made her happy: ceramic frogs, dragonflies, butterflies, yellows, blues, greens, and an epic craft room.  David lived two doors down from Artie and Cheryl for a few years.  Cheryl really enjoyed the closeness with her son.

Over the years, Cheryl battled many health problems, mainly due to the immuno-suppressant medicine she had to take to prevent her body from rejecting her liver transplant.  She was a breast cancer survivor, a skin cancer survivor, and she lived with aspergillus, a fungus in her lungs.  She was incredibly strong to face so many difficulties with the grace and bravery that she did.

In 2016, Artie and Cheryl moved to Kauai with David and Rebecca and her family.  They started off renting a house together until they found the right house to buy together.  They bought a house with an acre of land, and all 8 people lived in it together for almost 5 years.  Cheryl's health was poor for all the years in Kauai. Even so, she enjoyed seeing her grandkids grow up.  Ella was one year old when they all moved in together and Grandma Cheryl was able to spend a lot of time enjoying her.  It was even more fun when Ella was old enough to enjoy crafting with Grandma.  Ella had a special drawer in Grandma Cheryl's craft room full of craft supplies just for her.

Artie and Cheryl bought a condo of their own on Kauai after being tired of waiting for the county to approve plans to build a second house at the main property.  The county dragged the building process out for years and it is still unresolved.  Cheryl got to start fresh decorating her new home, filling it with joyful turquoise decorations, her favorite color.

Cheryl quickly declined after suffering a stroke that snowballed into many other problems.  She has passed away peacefully surrounded with love. Her husband was standing on one side of her bed praying over her and holding her head, and her daughter was on the other side holding and squeezing her hand.

My mom was full of love for so many and one of the most generous and thoughtful people I know. Thank you for reading her story, adding to our collection of memories, and being a part of her life. -With so much love, Rebecca