LaDonna Marie Wind, beloved daughter, wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and friend, passed away peacefully on January 16, 2025.
LaDonna's Memorial Service will be at 3pm on February 15, 2025, at St Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church in Mission, Kansas. Father David Cox will officiate. Interment therein will immediately follow the Memorial Service. A brief reception will follow.
LaDonna Mae Wind was born to Virginia Esther (Sander) McCardwell and Mark Twain McCardwell on May 11, 1938, in Hays, Kansas. LaDonna, an only child, grew up in Winfield, Kansas where she attended the one-room District 77 Pleasant View (Frog Hollow) Elementary School, and then attended and graduated from Winfield Junior | High School in Winfield, Kansas. LaDonna's youthful summers encompassed her father's Midwest rodeo career and principally calf-roping competitions. LaDonna learned equestrian, and she played string instruments in school.
LaDonna Marie Wind, how and when her middle name changed is unknown, married her high school sweetheart, Robert Anderson Wind on August 18, 1956, in Winfield, Kansas. LaDonna and Robert had and raised three children: Deborah Wind of Edmond Oklahoma; Robert Wind II of Yorktown, Virginia; and Stephen Wind of Edmond, Oklahoma. LaDonna spent many years home-keeping while Robert held a career in the aerospace industry and later business proprietor, and that spanned living in Florida, New Mexico, California, Kansas, Alabama, and Kentucky. LaDonna's most significant accomplishment and greatest joy was raising her three children. She was an accomplished self-taught seamstress, a hat maker and loved cross stitch. LaDonna later held positions covering 40 years encompassing leading Church Youth, Church choir, teaching Christian Education, advising theology, and writing lay sermons of which the Episcopal Church published two as part of its Sermons that Work. Her life is one of unyielding faith, kindness, and empathy.
Proceeding LaDonna in death is her husband, Robert Anderson Wind, and her mother, Virginia Esther (Sander) McCardwell and father, Mark Twain McCardwell.
Surviving LaDonna are her children: Deborah Wind, Robert Wind II and daughter-in-law Michelle Wind, and Stephen Wind and daughter-in-law Lisa Wind; five grandchildren: Danielle, Dane and granddaughter-in-law Lauren, Tristan, Laurel, and David; and two great-grandchildren, Ridley, and Barrett.
Memorial gifts to St Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church are welcome. LaDonna's family is immensely grateful for those joining the Memorial Service.
LaDonna's loss is deeply felt by her family and all those who knew and loved her. Her memory will continue to live on in those whose lives she touched.