Woodbridge resident visited by 25 sisters
Woodbridge resident Donna Goldberg was elated when her 25 sisters gathered at her home and hit the streets of Lodi for a reunion back in August. It had been more than a decade since all the LeBaron sisters had gotten together.
“We have only gotten together, all 26 of us, one other time and it was 14 years ago in 2003,” Goldberg said. “We all met up in Miami and took a week’s cruise to the Bahamas. We all boarded the ship with matching Tshirts that said ‘LeBaron Sisters’ and then it had our names with our birth date on the back, and everyone that saw the big group of sisters thought we were sisters in Christ or sisters on a mission or sisters in a religious sense, and we’re like ‘no, we’re biological sisters.’ We had the most amazing time.”
After the death of Goldberg’s mother in March, one of the Goldberg sisters started a WhatsApp account and added all 26 sisters so that they all could keep up with one another.
“It would be a way of checking in every day and finding out the latest news, like whose a grandma, whose having babies, whose traveling and whose doing what,” Goldberg said.
A few weeks after connecting on WhatsApp, one of the sisters suggested that they needed to have another reunion, and all the sisters agreed.
“I just spontaneously went to my calendar and looked and saw that I was going to be able to host them Aug. 24-28, and I just threw it out there. I said ‘I’m inviting everybody to California and its wine country and there is so much to do here and you need to come.’”
Within minutes her sisters were responding with how much they could donate towards food and drinks for the reunion and before she knew it almost all of her sisters were onboard to attend the reunion.
At first, some of the sisters were afraid they weren’t going to be able to attend due to other family obligations, but it all worked out in the end and all the sisters were able to come.
“I had been here since 1989 and several of my sisters had never, ever been to my home, and I was just so excited that they were all going to come,” Goldberg said. “Right away everyone was like ‘we don’t want hotels, we want to do it like old times like a big slumber party. We’re staying with you Donna,’” she said.
Goldberg ended up borrowing six queen size air mattresses to accommodate all of her sisters in her large home purchased by her late husband Marshall, who died of leukemia in 2003. She was able to put an air mattress in everyone of the extra bedrooms, as well as her den and her formal living room. Goldberg even hired a photographer to document the reunion. Goldberg’s sister Verlana Gutierrez from Alaska nominated herself as reunion president taking charge and collecting $75 from each sister to help with T-shirt costs and meals for the reunion weekend. The sisters had pink T-shirts with the Lodi Arch featured on the front and underneath read “LeBaron sisters 2017.” The back of the T-shirts read “Daddy’s Girls and underneath their father’s name, birth date and death date was listed. Underneath their father’s name were the names and birthdays of the sisters from eldest to youngest.
Goldberg prepared welcome bags for her sisters which included beach towels with their names embroidered on them, coffee mugs with unique and inspirational sayings on them and scriptures engraved on the rim and a stemless wine glass. Upon his death, Goldberg’s husband, Marshall, asked that he never be forgotten and because she was so thankful that he purchased such a large home that could accommodate all of her sisters, she wanted to make sure he was remembered during the reunion. While on a trip to the Marshall’s department store, she came up with the idea to use Marshall’s bags as the gift bags she would use to make the welcome bags for her sisters.
“On Thursday night after the Farmers Market when all 26 of them were here, we set up chairs outside in a row and I welcomed them all,” Goldberg said. “I just said ‘this bag has really special meaning,’ and I said ‘if it wasn’t for Marshall we wouldn’t have been able to get together like this and enjoy our time and he never wanted to be forgotten so hopefully you’re reminded of Marshall when you get your bag.”
The sisters began to trickle in on Wednesday, Aug. 23 and by Thursday evening all the sisters had arrived. The sisters came from 10 different U.S. states including North Dakota, Alaska, Wisconsin, Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Montana, Minnesota, Washington and California as well as three locations in Mexico, including the states of Sonora, Chihuahua and the city of Cancun.
“Talk about a miracle that we were all able to come together for a second time in our lives,” Goldberg said. “I can’t
tell you the excitement and love I felt just seeing them from all of the different places they came in from.”
On Aug. 24, 20 of the sisters attended the Farmers Market. That Friday night, Goldberg surprised her sisters by inviting her friend Gladys Bates, a local Realtor and professional dancer, to come over and talk about the background of belly dancing and women’s sexuality. She also performed for all the sisters and by the end she had them all dancing, Goldberg said. Bates gave the sisters crosses and told them to take them home and remember to pray for each other. Another one of Goldberg’s friends presented the sisters with candles. Also on Friday evening Goldberg invited the Travelers music band to perform at her home.
For three days the sisters enjoyed themselves poolside at Goldberg’s home.
“It was just fun in the sun and relaxation time at the pool. We had gone and got every kind of cold cuts, drinks and salads and food was just everywhere. They enjoyed good food and good wine and just had a great time for three days,” Goldberg said.
Goldberg’s eldest sister Rhea Watters made cinnamon rolls,
pecan candy and caramel popcorn for the sisters. Goldberg’s sister Verla Kuehn made 26 different aprons and wrapped them up and the girls engaged in a game of white elephant.
“We had the time of our lives, and it was like a Christmas party outside by the pool, so that was a wonderful time,” Goldberg said.
One night during the reunion Goldberg treated the sisters to food from Dave Wong’s in Stockton. On the last day of the reunion Goldberg did a presentation on hope before the sisters gave their tearful goodbyes.
Goldberg was brought up in a Mormon fundamentalist upbringing in Chihuahua, Mexico and was the fourth of her father Verlan LeBaron’s 58 children. He had 29 girls and 29 boys. Out of all the children 49 are alive today, including 26 women and 23 men. Only seven of Verlan LeBaron’s 10 wives had daughters. Goldberg’s mother Irene Spencer gave birth to six and adopted one of the 29 girls. Her first daughter died at birth and her daughter Sandra died of breast cancer at 33. In all, Spencer was the mother of 14 of the 58 children.
Goldberg is the second oldest
out of all of her sisters, with her sister Rhea Watters, 63, being the oldest and her sister Caroline Grijalva, 36, being the youngest. Grijalva was born after their father’s death and was never able to meet him. Between the sisters there are 165 nieces and nephews with two of Goldberg’s sisters having 14 children each. While some of the sisters have chosen to leave the Mormon faith, some have chosen to remain in that religion or carry aspects of it in their lives. Goldberg was the first of her sisters to leave and marry outside the Mormon lifestyle.
A majority of the sisters are stay-at-home moms, some having there own part-time cleaning business where they clean houses while their children are in school. Melanie Veeh is the only sister to receive a college degree and is the CEO at Denali Foods in Anchorage, Alaska and Goldberg’s sister Jeannette Bolton works in car sales.
Though the sisters as a whole don’t have the chance to get together that often, Goldberg and the rest of Spencer’s daughters have made it a point to get together at least once a year since the death of their mother.