Memorial Services for Bessie Marie Monson, of Clarks Grove, will be at 4 p.m. Friday at Bonnerup Funeral Service in Albert Lea. The Rev. Richard Spande will officiate.

Bessie died on Sunday, April 14, 2013, at Mayo Clinic Health System in Albert Lea. She was 76.

She was born on Oct. 13, 1936, in Aurora, Ill., the daughter of John and Ethel (Mueller) Shukis.

She attended rural school in Illinois and then West Aurora High School

Bessie worked for Anfinsen Plastic in Aurora and had a babysitting service in her home caring for many, many children.

She had also worked for Hardees in Montgomery, Ill.

She met Curtis Monson and that brought her to the Clarks Grove area. They were married in 2000 at their home in Clarks Grove.

She had worked at the Smithy Corner Mart in Clarks Grove.

Bessie had been a member of the Moose, joining the Aurora Moose Lodge No. 400.

Bessie enjoyed camping, vacationing, traveling, painting and crafts. She loved talking on the phone and visiting with family and friends.

She will be greatly missed by her family, husband, Curtis, of Clarks Grove, daughter, Paula Craig and her husband, John, of Pima, Ariz., and their many foster children; step-children, Eric Johnson of Rochester and LaRae Johnson and her fiancé, Adam, of Blooming Prairie; seven step-grandchildren; brothers and sisters, Pearl Blackwell, Tom Shukis and Gary Shukis all of North Carolina, Percy Darrow of Pennsylvania, Tammy Bourgeois and J.R. and Chuck Shukis of Huntsville, Ala.; stepmother, Elizabeth Hegland also of Huntsville; special nephew, Stanley Fordyce of San Diego, Calif.; special niece, Betty Darrow of Naperville, Ill.; sisters- and brothers-in-law, Ruth Smith of Clarks Grove, Alice and Keith Swenson of Rose Creek, Cheryl Monson of Albert Lea, Russell Monson of Minneapolis and Larry and Bonnie Monson of Rio Rancho, New Mexico; and many, many nieces and nephews.

She was preceded in death by her grandparents, Chester and Pearl (Murst) Mueller; parents; her sisters, Leona Gastil, Rae Ellen Fordyce and her husband, Harold, and Rosetta Hammond; and brother Stanley Miller; sisters- and brothers-in-law, Earl Dwayne Smith, Theodore and Joan Monson, Thomas Monson, Charles Moore, Charles Blackwell, Mary Shukis and Frankie Darrow; and special niece Eva Marie Shukis.

Blessed be her memory!