Donna Henning
Donna Henning
Donna Henning

Obituary of Donna Jo Henning

Donna Jo Henning passed away on October 30, 2022, surrounded by those she loved and cared for following a short hospital stay. Donna’s energies and love went toward doing for others. She was the glue of the family. She focused on making her home comfortable and inviting and beautiful for her friends and family –always the hostess, and always thinking of ways to do something special for someone—a way to brighten her friend’s or family’s day. She knew everyone’s birthday, and if you were in her orbit she was sure to reach out to you to show her love. Her granddaughters Chloe and Josie were the light of her life bringing her so much joy. Every day she was thinking of ways she could help them and nurture and love them. They will always be a reflection of her love for them. Donna was born to Donald and Josephine Friis in Buffalo Center, Iowa, on December 21, 1951. After graduation from high school, she attended Mankato State College graduating in 1973 and made her first move to Arizona with her soon to be husband Rocky Bauman to teach on the Papago Indian Reservation. In 1976, they returned to Iowa where their first child Chandra Fay was born in 1977. After several years in Iowa, they returned to the Phoenix area where Donna worked in education and retail and where her second child Eric John was born in January of 1982. Except for a brief time in Texas in the mid 1980’s, Donna spent the rest of her life in the Valley of the Sun. Wherever Donna worked, she quickly became friends with her co-workers, and many of them became friends for the rest of her life. In 1987 she married Eddy Parris and they combined to raise Donna’s two children as well as Michelle, Noah, and Mark Parris. She was an involved and loving mother and step-mother, devoting herself to the well-being of all the kids. At the time of her death she was married to her loving husband Ted Henning who survives her. They were married for almost twenty years and Donna was, true to form, the light of Ted’s life and a beloved member of his extended family. Donna was preceded in death by her parents and one sister, Jackie Friis, and is survived by her daughter Chandra (Rick) Black, grandchildren Chloe and Josephine Black, son Eric Bauman, and sisters Mona Friis (Jack Jutting) and Belinda Friis as well as special cousins Annie, Patty and Becky. If you would like to do something in her memory- please consider a gift to our local NPR Station https://kjzz.org or Arizona Humane Society https://www.azhumane.org.
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We are deeply sorry for your loss ~ the staff at Regency Mortuary
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