Sharon (Sheri) Kay Kinney
Aug. 13, 1940 – March 29, 2023
Sharon (Sheri) Kay Kinney, 82, passed away peacefully in her sleep at home on March 29, 2023. She was born August 13, 1940, in Longview, Washington, to Allan & Edwardeen Lavender. She grew up in Willowcreek, Oregon, where her family owned a dairy farm. She married her high school sweetheart Milton Reynolds on July 21, 1958, at the Vale Christian Church in Vale, Oregon. They were married for 23 years and had three daughters. They later divorced. On November 25, 1996, she married Gary Kinney. They lived in Caldwell, Idaho, until her passing.
Sheri loved to love on people.
She loved to travel and spend time with family and friends. Her adventures took her on many trips including Hawaii, Mexico, and cruises to Alaska and the Caribbean. A couple of her favorites trips were going to Robert Schuller’s Crystal Cathedral, meeting Paul Revere and the Raiders on a cruise, seeing Neil Diamond live and many many trips to California to visit her girls.
She loved to crochet and knit; every kid and grandkid has something special made by grandma. Her hands were rarely still. She loved to gamble and was so lucky, spending hours (days) playing Blackjack, Let it Ride, and pulling slot machines. She had style in everything she did from the clothes she wore, the houses she decorated, to the way she lived her life. But most of all she loved her family & friends fiercely and we loved her back.
For 30 years, Sheri worked at the Bureau of Land Management. She worked in numerous offices beginning in Vale, Coos Bay, the Idaho State Office in Boise, and then retired from the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise. She made lifelong friends in her career at the BLM.
Her life was a living example of her favorite poem “The Footprints of God.”
Sheri is survived by her husband Gary Kinney; daughter Barbara (Barbie) Mooney; daughter Michelle (Shelly) Wood and her husband Joe Wood; daughter Raquel (Kelly) Kinney and her husband Tony Kinney; stepdaughter Laura McClelland and her husband Mike McClelland; stepson Kevin Kinney and his wife Mandy Kinney; brother Dave Lavender and his wife Arlene Lavender; brother Gary Lavender and his wife Diana Lavender; and many grandchildren, great-grandchildren and many nephews and nieces.
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