Debra A. CRAIG

Our Viking Shield-Maiden has passed. Debbie will be greatly missed by her family and many friends, specifically her daughter, Mickala Sanchez (Alan); step-daughter, Samantha Lundblom (Jim); grandkids, Mila, Christopher, Tristan, and Grace; her siblings, Lynn Wright, Karen McIver, Kathy Morgan, and Casey Hoff; and her niece, Sian Hoff. She will also be fondly remembered as the 'fun aunt, who always gave the coolest presents' by her many nieces and nephews.



Debbie was blessed with many great friends over the years, and the family would like to express special acknowledgments and gratitude towards her life-long friends, Wendy McPhee, Deb Townsend, and Brenda Little-Spearman.

Debbie was born in Prince George, BC, the youngest of five children to Mollie Jackson and William Hoff. Born feisty and with a passion for standing up for what she believed in, she carried her strength and beliefs throughout her life and career. Moving to Williams Lake, BC, she worked as an administrator with Forestry, the Probation Office, and then started her 35-year career at the BC Government Employees Union (BCGEU). She met and married Gregory Craig (Trapper), and they had one daughter together. After many years of living in the Caribou Chilcotin, Debbie and her family moved to Victoria.

Debbie lived her life to the fullest and loved many things. She was a poet and wrote hundreds of beautiful poems, she loved to make colourful quilts, and each year counted down the days to her annual fishing trip with her sister and brother at Tsayta Lake. Debbie lived a full life in her short time with us and travelled to the places she had always dreamed of seeing. She walked along the volcanic beaches and many waterfalls of her ancestral homeland of Iceland, and wandered the ancient sites of Easter Island. Debbie swam in the warm, clear blue waters of the South Pacific, sailed around Cape Horn, and played with the penguins in the Falkland Islands. She stood in awe at the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg and lunched in Amsterdam with her granddaughter, Mila. Debbie was always grateful for the places she saw and inspired those around her to experience more of the world.

Debbie was a powerful person, and she stood up what she believed. Her natural born advocacy meant that she spent a lot of time doing things for others and helping those in need. She dedicated many hours making quilts for oversea orphanages and victims of the Fort McMurry fire and making toques and mitts for the Victoria Women's Transition House.

Debbie was diagnosed with lung cancer, and after a valiant battle fighting the disease and returning to work at the BCGEU, she was devastated to discover the cancer had returned and spread. Debbie still had a lot of life to live, and as she faced the same disease that took her mother, she expressed her gratitude in living in a country where she could now make a choice that her mother did not have. Debbie passed away on June 5, 2019, a day that she chose to pass, surrounded by love.

The family would like to extend their gratitude towards the army of doctors and nurses at the BC Cancer Clinic, Hospice, Palliative Care, and the MAID program. You all helped her immensely through the process and we are so grateful for all that you do.

As our dear loved one and poet would appreciate, Debbie, "May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest." - Shakespeare, Hamlet.