Grandpa Kopec

This weekend some of my dad's family was down from Chicago. They weren't able to make it to the funeral for my Grandpa, so they were here so we could spread Grandpa's ashes and celebrate his life. We met them on Sunday and we went to one of Grandpa's favorite fishing spots to spread his ashes. For as long as I can remember, Grandpa always said that when he passed away, he wanted to be cremated and have his ashes spread at Rend Lake; then when we were fishing and caught a fish, we were supposed to look at it and ask, "Is that you Grandpa?!"......corny, I know....but that's Grandpa!! And, no, I'm not telling where the spot was....you'll just have to wonder when you're at Rend Lake if Joe is there!!

Here's Uncle Jerome doing the honors:


Grandpa looooved malted milk balls....whoppers, preferably. He always had a box on hand and apparently he had always been that way. One of my dad's cousins brought a huge jar of milk balls and we all were to take one and throw it in the water also. See all the rings in the water?


Grandpa was a great man who always told corny jokes (not always clean ones either!), he would unknowingly shoot corn juice in your face when he was eating corn on the cob, and ate more junk food than anyone I knew. He loved his dog, Jopec, and fed him just as much junk food as he ate. He was a great bowler who invented Ball Trak and was always trying to come up with some crazy invention to improve the game. Grandpa wore the same "Grandpa Kopec" shirt to alllll family functions, because he was proud of his grandkids. He was one of those "old" people who rode the bus to the riverboat casino and took a ziploc doggy bag in his shirt to bring Jopec leftovers from the buffet. He signed every single one of my cards with "God and I both love you"..........love you too, Grandpa Kopec.