Julie Francis Vandewalle Way (Julie Bird)

My beloved Julie died this morning, January 29th, 2021. I just left the funeral home where I gave her one last kiss and hug.

I have been posting pictures of her on my page for the last few weeks as she was in the final stages.

Her birthday was January 22, 1960 and was born in South Bend, Indiana. She is survived by her 94 year old mother and 9 siblings, and many nieces and nephews. Two older sisters, Helen and Mary, have already passed due to complications from MS. We have identical twin boys, Elliot and Taylor, born in 1992 who have grown to become loving men.

Julie enriched the lives of everyone she met.

Everyone, and I mean everyone, loved Julie with her infectious smile and playful spirit.

I met her in a ski club in the Fall of 1984, and although she had just learned to ski she wanted to ski the double black diamonds (the hardest trails) with me; I fell in love with her on the Wildfire trail at Killington VT on our first day together. We skied every weekend nearby in Vermont and New York, and took ski trips to Colorado, Utah (ah Snowbird/Alta), Wyoming, and honeymooned skiing in Austria – St Anton and Kitzbuhel - for two weeks. We married on March 12, 1988.

She was fearless and jumped onto my rocket called a Hobie Cat sailboat. Screaming reaches - with me having both of my feet on the rudder casting and her having one foot between mine also on the rudder. We were a good team with her calling the tacks and gybe, with me overruling only for tactical reasons with other boats nearby. We sailed all over the east coast from Virginia Beach to Maine, NY finger lakes and Lake Michigan.

I am extremely proud that she was one of the first female telephone linemen at Verizon. She loved working outside with her own bucket truck and watching the wildlife below her.

Julie trained as an artist and she made many wonderful pieces that grace our home. In her later years she made a lot of rock art.

She developed, inspired, and directed 23 Hobie Costume theme parties at at our home on Lake Ontario, Our house grew to 15 bedrooms and 7 baths to accommodate our guests. Many attendees have commented that these were the best days of their lives, I was constantly amazed that she was able to get our Hobie guests to do some of the wild activities involved at the theme parties.

We also hosted her large family for a week at our Lake compound each summer and we have wonderful memories of watching all her nieces and nephews grow up. Many of them I taught to sail. Our personal fleet grew to 4 Hobies. 3 sunfishes, 4 canoes, 2 kayaks and an F-27 Corsair and dingy.

She was a prankster and loved to make people smile.

We loved our Lake House and thought we would be there forever. Nearly every night we toured our 2.5 acres to see the new activity in all our gardens with a glass of red wine.

We were able to enjoy 2 barefoot charters on large sailing catamarans in the Caribbean with our friends and returned to Austria/Salzburg on our 18 wedding anniversary with our sons, and during that trip visited Venice for a few days. My sons just loved torturing their Mom in her wheelchair on the cobblestones in Innsbruck.

Julie needed to retire in 1997, but that allowed her to spend the summers at the lake with our sons. They combed the nearly mile long sandy beach for treasures.

We needed to sell our beautiful home to be nearer medical services in 2017. By then we had more than 400 photographs on our walls from all the parties. Now they are preserved in several volumes.

Despite the progression of MS Julie was fighter and never complained. She mowed our 2.5 acres at the Lake House until she just couldn't anymore. I even jacked the tractor up and hoyered her onto the machine.

We will have a memorial for her at Kim and Mary Roberts Lake Home on Duane Lake in late May or early June. I plan to play “Angel Eyes by Jeff Healey” if I can handle the emotion. I played for her nearly every night in the later years when she was bed bound.

Finally, I am incredibly grateful she chose me as her partner.

Donations in her honor can be made to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

05/06/2021 JFC