Linda Irene Averill

Linda “Popper” Averill of Scottsdale, Ariz., died June 9, 2011. She was born May 6, 1949, in Evanston, Ill., and lived in Red Lodge, Mont., and Prescott, Ariz., before relocating to Scottsdale.

She owned and worked at the Red Lodge Zoo and was instrumental with donations of cash, equipment and animals in the formation of Zoo Montana, now in Billings. Her friends there may remember her joyously riding the elephant in the annual Fourth of July parade.

She spent glorious summers at her family's home at Grand Island, Mich., on Lake Superior, a place that held special magic for her.

Arriving in Prescott in 1996, she met her future husband and partner, Jeff Deming. Linda's talents with arts and crafts, making nature spirits and fairies, as well as her interior design abilities with one-day room makeovers, lead to various business opportunities.

Wherever she went, she showed those around her how to appreciate life with more gratitude, joy and fun; to enthusiastically appreciate nature, beauty, color and creativity; and most of all, to love themselves and others honestly and fully. She cultivated lifelong friendships with compassion and understanding, deepening connections with all her friends.

She believed in the "Fairy Dust" of love and inspired those around her to reach beyond their self-perceived limitations. She could turn something ordinary into a thing of extraordinary beauty.