PJ Chipman, 1921 - 2009

You might think the trip from the last post was as busy as it could get. However, our family had another very significant experience we were working through at the time. This was an emotional time for all of us, as we waited and prepared the week before my parents left for my grandmother's passing. I love my grandmother, and had a great friendship with her. She is such a wonderful woman, and I'm grateful that I have had the honor and opportunity to be her granddaughter. This post is in honor of Phyllis Jensen Chipman.


Phyllis Jensen Chipman passed away on Thursday, June 25, 2009 from natural causes associated with aging. She was born in Springville (January 14, 1921 to Franklin M. and Ovanda Miner Jensen), grew up in Mapleton, and raised her family in Bountiful, Utah. After serving in the Great Lakes Mission (1942-3) and graduating in accounting from BYU, she worked for IBM in Oakland, California, Endicott, New York and Salt Lake City, Utah. She married Dean Whitaker Chipman in the Salt Lake Temple and together they raised the nine surviving of their 10 children. They made a great team as they worked together with family, church, and his business of tax and estate planning. She loved her family, gardening, family vacations, teaching children and adults in her church, and continuous learning.She lived long, learned much, and taught many lessons to her family by example.

A few great stories about grandma:

• Grandma grew up in a time when ladies wore silk stockings. During the depression, when there was no money for stockings, she'd draw a line up the back of her leg for the same effect. The line had to be STRAIGHT.
• Grandma had a great job at IBM, but it took some politics to get her a job in the state where she and grandpa lived just after marrying. The gentleman she was working for in Salt Lake didn't like Mormons, so she went to her old boss in California. This boss went above her current boss's head and got the transfer for her.
• Grandpa proposed to Grandma in ten days. Sometimes love's just like that, and what a love story they had. When grandpa died of cancer 17 years ago, he wrote out TEN years of cards for Valentine's Day, her Birthday, Christmas, etc. so she would have something from him.
• Grandma typed family letters for YEARS on a type writter. The envelopes always said that they were coming from "PJ Chipman". She worked hard to keep her family connected, even though the nine kids were spread out all over the US.
• I loved the blanket Grandma brought me when she came to see me just after I was born.
• Grandma had an INCREDIBLE garden. I loved the raspberries, as well as the grape juice that came out of it. I especially liked the grape juice when it got mixed with 7-up.
• Grandma made sure that all of her daughters took sewing lessons. I took my first formal sewing lessons from the same teacher--Margaret Farmer--when I visited her during the summer before sixth grade. I made a purple and blue plaid jumper--and matched the lines. I've been sewing ever since.
• The summer before David went to BYU we went on a family trip to Seattle and took grandma with us. I loved walking around escorting her. I felt so lucky to be in her presence.
• Some of my sweetest memories with her included visiting her while I attended BYU. I'd bring my sewing projects up to show her and she would tell me such marvelous stories. We'd come home from church and she'd direct me around the kitchen to make the most delicious dinners. Sometimes I would read stories to her as well from the books she was reading.
• How many women do YOU know who went back to school when they were past 70 to go to masters level classes so that they can take over the family TAX business? I wouldn't even do that at 30!
• Grandma was (is) such a lady, and not one to complain. I don't know how she lived with arthritis for so long, but I am so thankful for her example. Some of you may know that this has great significance to me personally. She is such a champ! She was very crippled towards the end of life, and I am so happy at the thought that she is no longer burdened by the difficulties of the disease and the pain that she was in towards the end of her life.

These are, of course, just a few of the many wonderful memories that I have of this wonderful woman. Most of all, I am thankful for the testimony that I have that families can be together forever. I have so much respect and admiration and love for this woman. I love you, Grandma. And, I miss you.