There were many names on the memorial ornament Langley City Councillor Rosemary Wallace made for National Grief and Bereavement Day at Langley’s Derek Doubleday Arboretum on Tuesday.
“It’s a beautiful event to remember people that you’ve lost but it also brings up a lot of emotions,” Walllace said.
“I lost my mom when she was 53, and my mother-in-law, and I’ve lost my dad six years ago,” Wallace told the Langley Advance Times.”
“I lost my son-in-law at the age of 26, and a sister-in-law, lost a nephew a few years ago at the age of 33 and a brother-in-law two years ago, and of course grandparents and friends and other people that I couldn’t fit on this,” Wallace said as she held the ornament.
About 150 people attended the event organized by the Langley Hospice Society to hang memorial ornaments, with many taking part in a candlelight walk through the park in memory of loved ones.
It was the fifth annual Walk to Remember, led a by a piper and volunteers guides with flashlights.
Walk to remember at Derek Doubleday Arboretum organized by Langley Hospice Society pic.twitter.com/2TCaMllhnQ
— Langley Advance Times (@LangleyTimes) November 19, 2025
Shannon Todd Booth, Langley Hospice Society Executive Director, said many people were “intermittent’ visitors who dropped by to chat and hang ornaments without talking part in the walk.
“Honestly, we’re just happy to hold space in meaningful ways for those who show up,” Todd Booth said.
One of the participants, Stephannie Rosencrans, Adult Bereavement Coordinator at the hospice, described the event as a “really beautiful community event.”
“To just reflect on those that have had a big influence on my life that have gone on and that I miss and love and it’s a way to honor them and remember them,” Rosencrans said.
On Tuesday, she was thinking about “my friend Beth [Whitehead] who always asks me every year to put up ornaments for her parents and she passed away last December. So this year I put up an ornament in remembrance of her.”
Angela Elemans, Palliative Support Coordinator with Langley Hospice Society, valued the opportunity “for our clients, our families, to remember their loved one in a setting with people like them who have also lost a loved one. It’s just a quiet, special way to remember somebody.”