Betty DeForest

On October 18, 2013, Betty Lou DeForest joined her parents, her sister, Lillie; her daughter, Frances; and her grandson, Billie Joe in God's wonderful light after a stroke took her from us here on earth.
From beginning to end, Betty's life was a hard scrabble; she was born in a tent next to a set of railroad tracks in Ballinger, Texas, and those tracks would come to symbolize her life as she wandered from place to place before she finally called Buhl, ID, her home. She would often tell stories of how her mother, Lydia, would shoot possum and squirrel just so she, Lillie and her other siblings, Faye and Bud, would have food on the table, or would boil sour milk so they could have something to drink. She would also talk about living near the river banks and putting watercress on bread so her own children, Jimmy Ray, Edward and Frances, would have something in their bellies as well.
However, through the tough times, there were the great times as well; she loved to embarrass her grandson, Richard, by telling everyone who would listen how her Richie would follow her everywhere dragging along his little yellow "bug", or about how she shot her 5 x 5 buck uphill with a lever action open site 30/30…the one no one thought she could hit.
For Betty, God and family were everything; she never recovered from the heartbreak of losing her daughter to cancer last year; so now it is time to lay her to rest next to her beloved Frances. Her children, Jimmy Ray and Renee Conn, and Edward and Cindy Baker, along with the rest of her very extended family, will hold her close in our hearts until it is time for us to join her.