- Date Of Birth: February 16, 1964
- Date Of Death: January 7, 2017
- State: New Mexico
Kathryn (Kathy) Gay Dennis was born February 16, 1964 in Ft. Knox, Kentucky. Kathy lived with her parents, Jim and Christa Cooper in Cottonwood Falls, Kansas and Copperas Cove, Texas before moving with her family to Albuquerque in the late 1960s. She passed away Saturday, January 7, 2017 at her home in Albuquerque. She attended Osuna Elementary School, Eisenhower Middle School and Sandia High School. She also attended Ft. Lewis College, Durango, Colorado and UNM. She moved to Canada, where she married and had two children, Nathan and Amy. She later divorced and returned to Albuquerque.
Kathy married George Dennis in 1998, raising her two children, Nathan and Amy, who now live in Colorado and Manitoba, respectively. She loved music and was a talented singer and pianist. She loved playing her new grand piano. Always competitive, she loved games and was an up-and-coming duplicate bridge player. Often when we’d given up on a jigsaw puzzle at 1:00 am, we’d wake up to find it finished… Kathy refused to let the puzzle win! She also loved being fit and was a devoted speed-walker and earned a black belt in Tae Kwon Do.
A member of Calvary Church for years, she volunteered in many ministries. In the last few years she worked as the pre-school music teacher, combining her love of children, singing & music; she believed strongly in musical self-expression. As the Assistant Director of the Children’s Choir at Christmas, she was instrumental in the success of the beautiful Christmas pageants in which over 100 children performed. Her love of children was innate–a babysitter from age 10, she rarely heard a baby cry that she didn’t have to run take a look. In 2016, Kathy received a diploma for Biblical and Theological Studies from Trinity Southwest University. She was surprised by the amount of reading and writing, but, like jigsaw puzzles, refused to let the homework win. She wrote 120 papers in nine months and graduated with straight A’s. Upon graduation, Kathy was hired by Calvary. Kathy is survived by George, Nathan and Amy, Christa, Karen and husband, Marc, stepson Michael and wife, Misty and their son Braxton, and step-daughter Nora and husband Mike, and their children, Ava and Mason. A babysitter to the end, Kathy delighted in caring for Braxton. Kathy is also survived by her Aunt Selma, and other extended family in Kansas, and her step-mother Pat Dennis and family in California. Kathy was preceded in death by her father in 2013.
Thursday, January 12th, 2017, 2:30pm, Calvary Albuquerque
