Reta Sonderegger

Reta Helen Sorensen Sonderegger, loving wife to Clayton, devoted mother to nine children, sweet grandmother, great-grandmother, and great-great grandmother, returned to her Heavenly Parents on Friday, November 15, 2024, following a valiant battle with cancer.

Reta was 97 years old at her passing. She left this life peacefully at home, surrounded by loving family on both sides of the veil. The last word we heard her speak in this life was “Clayton.” He had come to take her home.

Reta was born Sept. 15, 1927, in Driggs, Idaho, to Ida Helen Floyd and Marvin Leland Sorensen. She was born in her grandparents’ home. Reta was named after her grandmother, Maretta, and her mother, Helen. She had eight brothers and sisters. Reta came home to a one room cabin which had once been a granary. Her parents had cleaned and scoured it and turned it into a cozy little home. As a young child she had no electricity, no indoor bathroom, no running water, and they cooked on a wood stove. She was just two years old when the Stock Market crashed and plunged the country into a Great Depression. She was 14 when Pearl Harbor was bombed. One week before Reta’s High School graduation they received word that her oldest brother, Robert, had been killed in Italy, while serving in the 10th Mountain Division.

Despite the trials and hardships of her youth, Reta had fond memories of a loving home and family.

Reta attended Utah State University and while there she met a handsome young football player, Clayton Sonderegger.

He had just returned from serving in World War II. They were assigned seats next to each other in a chemistry class of 500 students. The chemistry took and they were married on April 2, 1948, in the Idaho Falls Temple. Together, they welcomed nine children into their home. They survived toddlers, teenagers, job losses, life-threatening automobile accidents, the loss of their home and farm in the Teton Dam flood, and health challenges. They always moved forward with faith and hope.

Reta had many interests and hobbies. She was a schoolteacher, a dancer, a voracious reader, a seamstress, a pianist, a singer, a genealogist, a gardener, a baker, an officer in the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers, and much more. Her greatest loves were the gospel of Jesus Christ and her family.

Reta was a lifelong member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Her first calling was as Primary secretary when she was in the 7th grade. She served many times in Primary as a pianist, chorister, and teacher. She also taught in the Young Women’s and Relief Society organizations. She served as a counselor in both ward and stake Relief Society presidencies and as ward Relief Society president. Reta and Clayton served three church missions together, one in the mountains of British Columbia, Canada, one in the Family History Center in Rigby, Idaho, and another in Peoria, Illinois, (which included Nauvoo). They also served together as ward missionaries. Five children, 25 grandchildren and 9 great-grandchildren have also served missions, to date. Reta and Clayton loved serving together as temple ordinance workers in the Idaho Falls temple.

Reta loved her family and served them with all her heart! She squeezed that love into good-night kisses and slipped it into bedtime stories. She sang it to her children in lullabies and planted it in her raspberry patch. She stitched it into frilly dresses, beautiful embroidery, warm quilts, and cuddly baby blankets. She lived it valiantly in her faith and tucked it into our hearts. We are forever grateful for her courage, her love, her example, her faith, and her testimony. We look forward to being wrapped again in the arms of her love.

Reta is survived by her six daughters, Faun (Eph) McMurtrey, Carol (Tim) Morrison, Kathy (Ed) Clapie, Renee (Bruce) Benson, Joyce (Bryan) Smith, and Charlene Sonderegger; and her three sons Ralph (Kim) Sonderegger, Kelly (Lora) Sonderegger, and Scott (Lisa) Sonderegger. She is also survived by two widowed sisters, Hazel Smith and Marilyn Wright, and her youngest brother, Mark Sorensen (Janet). She has 54 grandchildren, 118 great-grandchildren, and 15 great-great grandchildren.

Funeral services will be held at 11:00 am Saturday, November 23, at the LaBelle 2nd Ward Chapel, 4223 E. 528 N., Rigby, ID 83442. The family will receive friends Friday evening from 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm at the Eckersell Funeral Home, 101 W. Main Street Rigby, and again from 10:00 am to 10:45 am at the LaBelle 2nd Ward Chapel, prior to services. Interment will be at the Pratt Cemetery, 695 E. Alta Ski Hill Road, Alta, Wyoming, 83414. Condolences may be sent to the family online to www.eckersellfuneralhome.com.