You may think it rather odd but I have a recently acquired MAC that I have named Betty. I've added a few parts. I only lack installing the sawdust flap and putting her name where the decal went to have her complete. She's good looking and used to hard work just like her namesake was. The eulogy below will clue you as why this one will be a keeper. Ron
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BETTY REDDING WOODS
September 6, 1929 – June 3, 2011
Much like her husband, Betty Redding Woods was a private person who did not want attention brought to herself. A native of Marion County (Florida), she was the first of two daughters born to the late Ralph and Josephine Redding. Her life was to be shaped by world events witnessed by few that are left. She was born in 1929, the year the Great Depression began. Her secondary education was received during the horrors of World War II, a time when high school students were taught aircraft mechanics and gasoline and other staples were rationed. It is little wonder that she was thrifty and watched every dime. Upon the conclusion of the war and graduation from Ocala High School, she married her lifelong mate, C.G. Woods, Jr., at the tender age of 17. In doing so, she laid aside two teenage girl dreams - to be a test pilot (her parents must have cringed at that ambition) and to be a fashion designer. She revealed the former to admonish that we all have foolish dreams that are better left unpursued. Betty encapsulated the other by embracing her love for sewing and making her own clothes. She loved to cook and she fed her family well. Betty possessed an independent spirit in keeping with her upbringing on a cattle ranch, but she kept this in check by her belief in God and her desire to be obedient to HIS Holy Scriptures. Betty was blessed with a high degree of intelligence and much talent. This was evident in her ability to spot a style and modify a dress pattern to reproduce it; her ability to create a recipe from a teenage son’s description of some new food he had tasted; and her ability to entertain, teach and discipline five sons while maintaining her own sanity. Betty enjoyed almost perfect health until she developed lymphoma in 1991. She continued to trust GOD although she didn’t know why she was to suffer so many years with this incurable cancer which took away her strength and sleep, then to have this joined with Parkinson’s disease which took away her ability to sew, hampered her cooking and reading, and left her dependent on others.
But more than any other attribute, her life was defined by self sacrifice for her family. She was the first one up and the last one to bed. She was the first to serve and the last to be served. If there was not enough to go around she declined a portion. She disclaimed her inheritance so her children and grandchildren would have a better life. She cared for her late husband at home in his declining years despite her own infirmities. She was truly a faithful and loving wife and mother.
Betty never flew an airplane, but now she has reached the Heavens. She never wore designer clothes but now she is clothed in clean, fine white linen. Betty never met a President but now she stands before the King of Kings.
Betty Redding Woods departed this life to join her precious LORD, her husband, her parents, her sister and many others who have gone on before her. She leaves behind five sons and daughters-in-law, sixteen grandchildren and seven great grandchildren. They expect to see her again and be reunited forever.
