Her son, Tim, and daughter in law, Jan ,were with her at the time.
Mabel had been making good progress in recovering from a fall in January this year and was looking forward to a planned visit from her Coleambally friends in a few days time.
Mabel and her late husband, Ned, came to live in Coleambally in 1970, in the exciting days when the ballots for land were taking place.
Ned was a returned soldier who took up the opportunity of growing rice in his mid-life years, with the help of his younger son, Tim.
Ned had been a captain in the Army. In the earlier part of the war he was an officer at the Murchison Prison Camps and later he was managing the Army vegetable farms at Adelaide River in the Northern Territory and in Cooktown, Queensland.
He also fought in the Philippines and in New Guinea. During these war years Mabel was at home in Albury with her young family of three children.
Prior to her marriage to Ned, Mabel was a student at Burnley Horticultural College in Melbourne.
Ned also studied at Burnley. Years later Mabel’s love of planning and growing beautiful gardens was really challenged when they settled on “Marloo” Farm 580 on DeSailly Road.
The tight clay soil needed lots of humus (old rice straw and cow manure) before it would produce the beautiful roses and the annuals that she delighted in taking along to share with friends at the Yamma Hall or Coleambally Uniting Church.
Mabel always had an interest in social welfare issues in Coleambally and supported the Uniting Church, Meals on Wheels and the Home Care Committee.
It was at one of the many associated meetings that she suggested that Coleambally build a hostel in the future, to plan for the care and comfort of the ageing community residents.
Until January this year Mabel very much enjoyed living in the Cypress View Hostel with many Coleambally friends around her and being cared for by the nurses and carers, all of whom she knew and loved.
The family are indeed grateful to the staff who gave consummate care to Mabel.
The family can recommend Cypress View Lodge for their christianly care that the nurses and all the staff are known to give.
The Garden Club was Mabel’s greatest enjoyment; she loved to visit farm gardens, town gardens and plant nurseries and to share her extensive knowledge with other keen gardeners.
The family of Ned and Mabel are John, now living in Maroochydore with his second wife Jackie; Jane, also in Queensland at Pomona; and Tim, who is retired from Farm 580, now living in Tocumwal with his partner Chris Dodds, daughter of Norma and Frank Shaw, another Coleambally rice grower.
Mabel loved her grandchildren, as they loved her. Meg and Bron, children of Jan and John Griffiths, lived nearby on Farm 559 on Gilbert Road.
Her granddaughters have loving memories of Mabel’s afternoon teas and sumptuous Christmas dinners, the fun of Grandma riding their new bikes at birthday time and feeding the orphaned lambs with a bottle of warm milk.
Mabel shared her horticulture knowledge with her grandchildren.
Meg is a mother of two and a social worker living in North Melbourne, Bron is a busy mother with three children and lives in New Jersey, US.
Her family and the community will miss Mabel, a generous and warm-hearted lady.
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