Joan Arlue Sievers Strong, 79

Joan Arlue Sievers Strong was born on Oct. 13, 1939, in Kalispell to Henry Sievers and Bertha Baish Sievers, the latter formerly of Hinsdale, Illinois.

She passed away into the arms of the Lord on Oct. 8, 2019, dying of natural causes. As a young girl “Joanie,” as she was called, was raised in the Seventh Day Adventist Church by her father. She knew from a very young age that she wanted a large family. When she was 7years old she told her dad she wanted to be a nurse. She accomplished that goal by acquiring a Licensed Practical Nurse Certificate in the early 1970s and subsequently worked as a nurse for many years.

She was married four times, first to Donald E. Parker, then to Harold Schiele, Leo Arbuckle and lastly to Herbert Strong. She survived each of her four husbands.

Joanie loved her family, her grandchildren, dogs (especially dachshunds), and she loved to garden and always had an impressive array of roses and other flowers growing on her property. She was a wonderful mother, mother-in-law and grandmother. In 1983 she donated a kidney to her daughter Pamela Denise Parker. That kidney lasted Pam 16 years before failing in 1999. Pam then received a kidney from her sister Sandra; that transplant lasting only five months and in April of 2000 Pamela preceded her mother in death.

Joanie is survived by son Robert Donald Parker of Kalispell, grandson Christopher Parker of Libby, and granddaughters Izzy, Tieghler and Cyliegh Parker all of Libby, and grandson Shane Parker of Libby; her son Michael Wayne Parker (Bu-Young Lee) of Edmond, Oklahoma, grandchildren Kyle Parker and Leah Parker, and great-grandchildren Tanner Parker and Talon Parker of Oklahoma City; son Daniel Ray Parker (Jeanne Drollinger Parker) of Kalispell, grandson Joshua Parker (Codi Roberts), their children Enchantress Roberts, Tira and Damon Parker of Kalispell, granddaughter Lindsey Parker (David Boggs), their daughter Ayanna Parker of Kalispell, granddaughter Shannon McNamee (Peter McNamee), and their children Kean and India Swanson of Columbia Falls; daughter Sandra Schiele and grandchildren Emily and Bradley Burby of Washington state; son Justin Herbert Strong of Kalispell. Her daughter Pamela Denise Yuhasz, who preceded her in death, had one daughter Carrie Yuhasz Dunn, who also has one daughter, Aislin Dunn.

Joanie’s body has been cremated, with the ashes to be strewn in a private family ceremony.