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Marsha Elaine Hammond passed away peacefully in her son Brian\u2019s arms in the early morning of December 16, 2023. Marsha was born on June 11, 1952, in Boone, Iowa to her parents, Wallace and Majorie (Warnke) Hammond. She graduated from Boone High School and worked in various administrative positions in Boone, including the Boone County Hospital.<\/p>\n
For the later part of her adult life, Marsha\u2019s battle with mental illness and chronic pain prevented her from adventuring out too far from home but in 2019 she was able to achieve her lifelong dream of visiting Montana and Glacier National Park with her son.\u00a0 She also found beauty and comfort in the outdoors near her home. Through the daily devotion of feeding birds, she became close acquaintances with many feathered friends; cardinals and cedar waxwings were her favorites. She liked having her hands in the dirt; tending to her flower gardens and her neighbors\u2019 flower gardens brought her great joy.\u00a0 She loved going for car rides along the Des Moines River and enjoyed sitting around a good hot bonfire as well.<\/p>\n
She loved the color purple, the smell of sage, the crunch of peanut M&M\u2019s and the sound of wind chimes on a summer evening. Music was therapy for her; she enjoyed rocking out to Elvis and Tom Petty. She loved being around and grooming horses, especially her beloved Arabian horse \u201cStolen Kisses.\u201d In her final three years, the time she spent with her grandson, Oliver, became one of the greatest joys of her life.<\/p>\n
The family would like to thank those who stood by Marsha and offered up a meal, hopeful message, warm hug, laugh or listening ear; you are appreciated very much.<\/p>\n
Marsha was preceded in death by her parents Wallace and Marjorie Hammond. She is survived by two sons Brian (Emily) Gibbs of Elkader, and Tom (Elaina) Gibbs of Boone; her sisters, Patty Boucher of Clive and Diane Gillespie of Van Meter; and grandson, Oliver Gibbs. Cremation services are being provided by Grau Funeral Homes of Elkader. Condolences can be sent to Brian Gibbs, PO Box 54 Elkader, Iowa 52043.<\/p>\n
Marsha leaves you with these lyrics from her favorite song:<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen the night has come,<\/p>\n
And the land is dark,<\/p>\n
And the moon is the only light we\u2019ll see,<\/p>\n
No I wont\u2019 be afraid,<\/p>\n
Just as long as you stand,<\/p>\n
Stand by me\u201d<\/p>\n
A private family service is being planned for a later date.<\/p>\n
Leonard-Grau Funeral and Cremation Service, Elkader, Iowa is helping the family with arrangements.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Marsha Elaine Hammond passed away peacefully in her son Brian\u2019s arms in the early morning of December 16, 2023. Marsha was born on June 11, 1952, in Boone, Iowa to her parents, Wallace and Majorie (Warnke) Hammond. She graduated from Boone High School and worked in various administrative positions in Boone, including the Boone County […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15549,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[1144],"class_list":["post-15546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-obituaries","tag-hammond"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15546"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15546\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15551,"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15546\/revisions\/15551"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15549"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graufuneralhomes.com\/lab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}