JUDITH CARMEN LEE
Judith Carmen Lee, 78, passed away June 9, 2019 in Bondurant, Iowa.
Judy’s celebration of life will be held at the Ankeny Memorial Funeral Home at 4208 North Ankeny Boulevard in Ankeny, Iowa on Sunday, June 30, 2019. Visitation begins at 1 p.m. and services will begin at 2:00 p.m. with burial at Ankeny Memorial Gardens cemetery.
Judy was born August 21, 1940 in Hatfield, Missouri to Donald and Lavon Thomas. She was a graduate of Mount Ayr High School and attended both Iowa State University and Northwest Missouri State. She decided to take off to San Francisco for an exciting new job. She eventually settled in at P&O-Orient Lines, a global steamship company. She met and married her husband, Jerry Lee, and settled down in Pleasant Hill, California. Almost three years later she and Jerry welcomed their twin daughters, Jennifer and Elizabeth. They decided to move back to Iowa where Judy’s family resided. After the family moved to Ankeny, Judy began work at the Airport Holiday Inn in Des Moines and stayed for 25 years.
Judy was very social and loved spending time with friends and family, including early morning “coffees in curlers” with friends in Chariton, Iowa, her sorority meetings and leading Girl Scout meetings. Like her mother, she was an avid reader and took her daughters weekly to the library. She “gently” encouraged music lessons and good manners!
Judy had a smile for everyone and loved to laugh and argue good-naturedly on just about any subject. Thanks to Judy’s mother Lavon and her insistence on music lessons, she could sit down at any piano (or her accordion) and play just about any tune. She was known to belt out a song anytime, anywhere: at church, to her young daughters, picking cherries on the farm, in the car where you weren’t allowed to open the windows (thanks Lavon), with her mom and sisters, friends or in the ladies room while she put on her lipstick.
Judy was a talented seamstress and made her own fashionable clothes often. When her twin daughters came along, she made dozens of matching outfits for them through the years. She even created her daughter Jennifer’s wedding dress from a bridal magazine picture.
Judy was a loving daughter, sister, wife, mother, aunt, cousin, grandmother and friend. She is preceded in death by parents, Donald and Lavon Thomas and husband, Jerry Lee. She is survived by twin daughters, Jennifer Campbell and Elizabeth Stephenson, son-in-law, Jim Campbell, sisters, Jinny Tagatz and Jill Davis, grandchildren, Chantel Young, Jacob Campbell, Jack Campbell, Brenna, Taylor and Emily Stephenson, great-granddaughter, Chloe Campbell, nieces, Traci Ross, Nicole Brooks, Carrie Sunderman and Teresa Hutchinson, and many more beloved relatives.
Online at www.MemorialServicesOfIowa.com.
