The family of Norma Pettijohn will celebrate her life and legacy of 91 years at Immaculate Conception Catholic Church in Sulphur, Louisiana. Norma went to her eternal reward in heaven on January 2, 2019 at 10:55pm in an assisted care facility. Her funeral Mass will be on Monday, January 7, at 2:30pm at Immaculate Conception Catholic Church in Maplewood. Father Aubrey Guilbeau will officiate the ceremony. Visitation will be 5-8pm on Sunday, January 6, with the rosary at 6pm in the funeral home. Burial will be at Mimosa Pines Cemetery in Carlyss.
Norma was born in Iota, Louisiana, November 11, 1927, the fifth child to Pierre and Lydia B. Pousson. She attended and graduated from St. Francis Catholic School. While she was employed at Cities Service, she met and later married her husband, Billy, in 1952. They were a devoted couple for 26 amazing years before his untimely death.
While her six children were very young, Norma enrolled in the Vincent School of Business, and upon graduation, she began her career at Firestone and retired as Administrator of Payroll, in 1982. Norma was a competitive woman who loved basketball and golf. She played on an All-Star team and was also Co-captain on the Cities Service Basketball team. Norma was keen to fashion and delved into modeling where she appeared in advertisements for GE Gold Medallion homes.
Upon retiring, she volunteered at Big Brothers/Big Sisters after seeing the success of the program with some of her own grandchildren.
Norma Jean, as she was affectionately called, loved gardening, music, dancing, games, cooking, traveling internationally and domestically, sewing and painting. She was an amazing woman who loved people and opened her home often to host friends, families and even strangers. She was very active at Immaculate Conception being a Eucharistic minister, an active member of the Catholic Daughters and a faithful member of the church choir until she was 80. Norma thoroughly enjoyed being a member of the Silver Singers group as well as the Phi Sigma Alpha sorority.
Norma leaves behind six children to carry on her legacy of strength, resilience, joy, and hospitality, as well as her love for family, God, music, humor and her rich Cajun culture. Her children are Lydia Pettijohn of Mobile, Alabama; Paul Pettijohn of Moran, Kansas; Ralph Pettijohn and wife Sharon of Ruston, Louisiana; Cathy Erickson of Wichita, Kansas; Ellen Stephens and husband James of Sulphur, Louisiana; and Suzanne Shipley and husband David of Birmingham, Alabama. She is also survived by seventeen adoring grandchildren and sixteen great-grandchildren. Her surviving siblings are Leonard Pousson of Lake Charles and Barbara Ogea and husband James also of Lake Charles.
She is preceded in death by her parents, Pierre and Lydia Pousson, her husband, Billy G. Pettijohn, and her siblings, Verda Baldassari, Milfred Pousson, Lubert Pousson, Harris Pousson, and Cornelia Watson.
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made in her name to Our Lady's Catholic School Gymnasium Fund in Sulphur.
Special thanks to the caregivers at Stonebridge Assisted Living in Sulphur who lovingly doted on Norma the past ten years and were such an amazing support system for our family. Words will never express how deeply we appreciate the sitters who watched Mom 24 hours a day for the past ten months. Her life was enriched by your presence and care.
