This Sunday, in the worship service at 10 AM, we will joyfully celebrate our oldest member's birthday. Dorothy Emeott turns 100 years old!  

Dorothy was born in Minnesota - the eldest daughter of six siblings. Dorothy was referred to by her mother as her "tower of strength."  She grew up in a farming family during the years of the Dust Bowl and times were hard. But she still managed to graduate from high school at the age of 16, the top of her class!  At the age of 17, Dorothy and all her family became Christians. "It made such a difference in my life," she says  

Dorothy has worked in a variety of jobs during her lifetime. She first worked in an optometrist's office full time for a whopping $10.00 a month. She was placed by an employment agency to cook for a millionaire and worked in a bakery as a sales person. It was in the bakery where she met her first husband whom she married when she was 26.  She and her husband moved out west. In 1952 in Bend, Oregon, 
Dorothy was ordained as one of the first women elders.  Dorothy has been a ruling elder for 63 years.

Dorothy took her daughter, Patrice and moved to Tacoma where she could train in Medical Records. Dorothy met her second husband at a dance at the Winthrop Hotel. He was a charming man and she married him in 1958 when her daughter, Pat was 12 years old.  Dorothy moved to Aberdeen because her husband managed the mills out there for the next 34 years. She still gets cards and letters from the folks there.

After retirement, her husband was going to teach her to play golf, but she didn't take to it which frustrated both of them. Dorothy suggested a compromise: "If you promise not to ask me to play golf, I promise not to play." The compromise worked well.

Dorothy took up oil painting in her mid-60's and found she had a talent for it. She painted all sorts of things - from sailing ships to babies. Her husband passed in 2006, after 48 years of marriage. Then she decided to move back to Tacoma to live with her daughter, Pat.

The summer Dorothy moved back to Tacoma, she was thinking about where to go to church. A friend of Pat's suggested Trinity. She walked here herself one Sunday morning and that Sunday was "Strawberry Waffle Breakfast Sunday!" She couldn't get over all the children at Trinity - those beautiful, bright little faces!

And Dorothy has been at Trinity most every Sunday since. Dorothy says that people get "hysterical" if she doesn't show up on a Sunday morning because they are worried that something has gone wrong. Dorothy likes the fuss. She knows that is shows that she's loved. She sees it in the care and faces all around her.

When asked what she knows now that she wishes she had known at 20, Dorothy replies, "To lean on God and trust in Him and He will give you what is best. It works"  A friend of Dorothy's said the secret of her joy lay in "God's ability and her availability." Dorothy likes that. It affirms to her another saying she likes,"Happiness comes from outer circumstances. Joy in the Lord can come even in the midst of sorrow."  

Following the 10 AM service there will be a birthday cake to celebrate this dear lady! All are welcome!