Ramona Lloyd Kern

September 20, 1935 – January 21, 2024 At the age of 88, Ramona Lloyd Kern, beloved wife, mother and grandmother, passed peacefully into the Lord’s hands on Sunday, January 21st in Newberg, Oregon. A funeral service with harp and traditional hymns loved by Ramona will be held at Newberg Church of the Nazarene on Monday, January 29, 2024 at 12:00 noon. The family may be greeted afterwards. A private interment at Valley View Memorial Park & Mausoleum will follow with arrangements by Attrell’s Funeral Chapel in Newberg. Ramona was the first child born to Owen Doyle and Mary Jones Lloyd of Little Rock, Arkansas on September 20th, 1935. Her father was an oil & gas ‘right-of-way man’ traveling throughout the Southern states during the Depression and war years, and her mother was a homemaker. She and her younger brother Aaron Doyle “Bud” Lloyd lived in Little Rock and Shreveport and Opelousas, Louisiana during their childhoods. A young Ramona was introduced to the Pacific Northwest during occasional stays in Yakima, Washington to visit members of her mother’s family, including her beloved cousin and lifelong friend, Eloise Jones Mellotte. Ramona was smart. She skipped a grade and graduated in the 1952 class of Little Rock Central High School at the age of 16. She began attending Bethany Nazarene College near Oklahoma City. After a year, she transferred to Northwest Nazarene College in Nampa, Idaho and studied Home Economics. There she met the love of her life on a blind-date, Stanley D. Kern, a student from North Dakota. Stan and Ramona were engaged when she was 19, as juniors, and were married a week before their graduation in May, 1956. Ramona used her alacrity with shorthand while working at the Social Security Administration to support her husband through medical school in Grand Forks, North Dakota and Kansas City, Kansas and in a medical residency at St. Luke’s Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri. Their first child, Joy Lynn was born in April 1958. A second child, Kyle Douglas, came three years later in February 1961. The young Kerns moved to Osceola, Missouri for two years before they determined to pull up stakes and make a new beginning in the Pacific Northwest. In 1962, they moved to Cottage Grove, Oregon and welcomed their third child, Laurie Elizabeth, just days before the Columbus Day Storm of 1962. A final move to the small community of 4,000 souls in Newberg came in 1963 when the young couple met and formed a lifelong bond with the pastor of the local Nazarene Church, Rev. Don Fivecoat, and his wife, Earlene. Ramona gave birth to their fourth child, John Barry in March 1964. Stan and Ramona settled into in one home in the Dundee hills for 22 years and in another on Oxberg Lake for a similar length of time, before retiring to independent living at Friendsview Manor in 2016. While raising her four children, Ramona worked as an interior decorator in the emerging ‘Northern Woods’ subdivisions of Newberg, designing midcentury modern floorplans and created welcoming, efficient settings for active families in the growing town. She was later a realtor and travel agent, but her real calling – and her gift – was in being a mother. She gave her heart to her children and prided herself in their successes, while being their constant companion and guide. Whether organizing lessons, acting as a scout den mother, shuttling kids to endless practices for sports, band, orchestra, or pushing them out the door for the 5:30 am Saturday “Ski Club” bus to Mt. Hood, Ramona affectionately and unceasingly cared for her children. While Dr. Stan provided care for the community, Ramona bandaged the scraped knees, calmed the nerves, and picked up and dusted off the troubles of her two boys and two girls. Ramona was compassionate. After her children ventured off to college (or bicycle rides to Alaska), Ramona found more room in her heart for girls she volunteered to mentor at Mountain View Middle School. Ramona was an active volunteer and supporter of the Medical Auxiliary of Yamhill County, Newberg Community Hospital (when owned by the City), and the American Cancer Society. She was an assiduous collector of art and antiques, and an avid longtime supporter and devotee of the Ashland Shakespearean Festival which she and Stan attended annually with their lifelong confidants and companions, Stan’s late brother Paul and his wife, Jeanette Kern. Beginning in the early 1980s and for the next 35 years, the Kerns began attending Portland First Church of the Nazarene where they were reunited with many of their friends from college days. Ramona embraced the scriptures through the ministry of Dr. Gary Alan Henecke, weekly Bible Study Fellowship and the church’s “Encouragers” Sunday School and Social Group. Her faith and her devotion to the Father increased in those years. Ramona welcomed her first grandchild in 1985 and her children gave her eight more over the coming fourteen years. She had three great grandchildren. In later years, Stan and Ramona traveled the world together. She relished their time spent in the Mexican Riviera, Palm Springs, and the Hawaiian Islands. She could often be seen in Newberg with a savage tan acquired in those warmer climes. She often invited longtime friends to join her and Stan on extended trips, including to Sunriver and the Oregon and Washington coasts. They explored Central Europe, Western Canada, and the harbor towns of Maine. On one trip with their daughter Laurie, they circumnavigated the globe with one leg as a week-long rail trip on the Siberian Express from Beijing to St. Petersburg. At the age of 85, Ramona was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease. Stan cared for her in their home singlehandedly for two years and beginning in 2023 she was lovingly cared for in the Friendsview Health Center. More recently, she resided in the Friendsview Memory Care Unit. Her family wishes to express their deep gratitude to the professional and care staff members of these care facilities. Ramona was predeceased by her parents and by one grandchild, Tristan Lloyd Kern. She is survived by her husband Stan and her four children, Joy K. Welcome (Dale), Kyle (Suzanne), Laurie K. Lieggi (John) and John (Nike), her brother Bud Lloyd (Judy), eight grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. In honor of Ramona Kern’s life, donations may be provided to the American Cancer Society. Gifts of flowers and other messages to the family may be directed to Attrell’s Funeral Chapel.

Ramona Lloyd Kern

September 20, 1935 - January 21, 2024