Wanda (Marchant) Rosander

With amazing grace, Wanda Marchant Rosander quietly and peacefully slipped into heaven on Sunday morning, September 29, 2024, for a joyous reunion with her husband, two of her children, her parents and ten of her fourteen siblings.  Her earthly journey finished, the kind, caring, generous, happy, funny and fun-loving Mother, Grandma, Great and Great-Great Grandma Rosey took her place in the choir of angels that welcomed her home.  She had done well and was a good and faithful servant her entire mortal life.

Wanda was born May 22, 1930, to Stephen Casper and Beatrice Alvaretta Peterson Marchant in Midvale, Utah, the fifth of fifteen children.  She grew up in the Liberty Park area of Salt Lake City where she learned the value of work and where the seeds of a life of service were planted.

She graduated from South High School in 1947.  Before her senior year of school, Wanda caught the eye and won the heart of Paul Rosander as they were both “cruising” through Liberty Park with their separate groups of friends.  They later became engaged, cruised into an eternal marriage in the Salt Lake Temple on October 21, 1948, and began to establish the Paul William Rosander family.  They stayed in the area of her childhood where their seven children were born between 1949 and 1960.  In 1964, the family moved to what is now known as Holladay, Utah.  This area was beloved by Wanda and Paul.  It provided a wealth of lifelong friendships, a bedrock of stability for raising a family and fertile gospel soil where their testimonies of our Savior took root and blossomed.

They lived in the Valley View 1st Ward for many years where Wanda faithfully served in many church callings in the Primary, Sunday School and Relief Society organizations of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  Paul and Wanda moved from the Valley View 1st Ward later in life but stayed in the Valley View Stake and lived in the Mount Olympus Condominiums across the street from Olympus High where all of their children attended school and where she continued her enthusiastic and well-established support of Titan athletics, music and theater.

She loved serving others and was a devoted care giver in her very core.  She cared for and watched over her younger siblings before and after her marriage, her widowed sister-in-law for many years, her aging mother and countless other family members, friends, and neighbors all while raising and caring for her own children and grandchildren as they came along.  She was happiest when she was busy helping and giving to others

Her kitchen was open to all and food was always available to her family and their friends.  Her special chocolate chip cookies were legendary and often made their way onto paper plates or into plastic baggies handed to you personally, and usually fresh from the oven, by Wanda as you left her home.  Her delicious banana bread and award-winning banana cream pies were coveted by all and you wanted to hang out after family dinners to see if you could be lucky enough to get some leftover pie sent home with you.

Family was immensely important to Wanda and Paul and they held regular family gatherings at their home, at the church and at the condo clubhouse and pool.  Wanda made holidays fun and cooked, baked and readied food for weeks before Thanksgiving and Christmas.  She loved setting up her many Christmas decorations before Thanksgiving to get the holiday season going.  Notably, the Holiday Barbies she had collected for decades took center stage right along with her cherished Nativities.   Christmas Bingo, however, is most likely the unanimously favorite memory for her family and was the biggest draw of the year for all ages.  From tap shoes to VHS tapes, stuffed animals to crayons and coloring books, toys to kitchen goodies, wrapping paper to decorations, she collected an endless array of treasures all year long every year just so she’d have a great variety of prize choices for everyone who called out “Bingo!”

Wanda could be stubborn, yet kind, firm, yet gentle, had a hilarious sense of humor and generously sugared her conversations with her darling laugh.  She loved to sing, read, play table games with friends and family, and travel.  Most of all, she lived for athletic and other performing events for her children, her grandchildren and her great-grandchildren.  She was an avid fan of the BYU Cougars, Utah Utes, Utah Jazz as well as every high school any of her posterity attended.

Though dementia at times robbed her in recent years of names, places, timeframes and events, Wanda did not lose her foundation of faith and family.  Unforgettable to her were her love and joy of family and her unwavering testimony of and faith in Christ.  Her legacy is living within the hearts, minds, souls and actions of her posterity through her example of charity, her faith in each of them and her hope for an eternal relationship with them forever.

The family would like to give special thanks for the gentle, attentive, loving care Wanda received at the Sunrise Memory Care facility.  She enjoyed the staff, had a “crush” on James, the director when she moved in, and loved helping everyone.  We appreciate all that was done to keep her comfortable, safe, happy and healthy in her circumstances.

Wanda will be deeply missed and is survived by her children:  daughters, Sharon, Becky (Clark) Nielsen and Diana (Dale) Hamilton; sons, Russ (Kathi Brown) and John (Toni Houston); and daughter-in-law, Diane (Johnson) Rosander; brothers, Dwight (Rosemary) and Byron Marchant and sisters, Karen (Ross) Derbidge and Marva (Roger) Davis and sisters-in-law, Ramona and Susan Marchant; 34 grandchildren, 86 great-grandchildren (with 2 on the way), 25 great-great-grandchildren (with 2 on the way); and numerous nieces and nephews and their growing families.  She was preceded in death by her sweetheart, Paul, their son, Paul Jr. and daughter, Wendy (Smith) Rosander and many Rosander and Marchant siblings and their spouses.  A grandson, Alexander Rosander Smith, passed away just six days after Wanda and has joined a heavenly reunion with his beloved grandparents, uncle and mother.

Memorial services for Wanda are under the direction of Holbrook Mortuary and will be held at The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints chapel located at 1925 East Gunderson Lane (4101 S) Holladay, UT, on Monday, October 21, 2024, at 11 am.  A viewing will be held at the same location on the evening of Sunday, October 20, 2024, from 6 to 8 pm and prior to the funeral services on Monday from 10 to 10:45 am.  She will be laid to rest at the Granite Cemetery located at 2969 E 9800 S in Sandy, UT.  

If you are unable to attend in person, please join virtually through the on-line link below.  It will be live beginning at 11 am on Monday, October 21, and throughout the funeral service.

https://zoom.us/j/97210642654?pwd=ZHFkamdybFJqZzNHaktOWUtFZzZpdz09