Sibyl Mary Yerex (Burton)

This part is written by Rob Carson Sibyl's nephew and a few stories when I used to visit:

Sibyl was the oldest of the ten kids and was married to Galvin Burton and they had 4 kids, Blaine, Miles, Brenda and Myrna.  Sibyl is responsible for the family tree of the Yerex family and she has it traced back to the 1600's!!!  But what I found most interesting was the little stories about the people that we are all related to and that's why I thought this would be fun for future generations.

As a kid growing up in the 70's in Winnipeg, going to the farms of my mom's family was always fun for me.  I got to ride horses, milk cows, feed the chickens, collect eggs from the chickens, dodge cow patties and the peacefulness of it didn't impress me until my 20's but when it did I started wondering what was going to happen to all the family farms with the changes in farming.  Big large farms were taking over and making a living farming was slowly going by the wayside.  Now I cherish every time I got to go to the farms and I love the wide open prairies and hopefully will be able to have a nice acreage out in the Neepawa area when I retire.

I can remember like yesterday driving into the Burton's drive way, the hill out front with the garter snakes that lived there.  The cats and the yard part in front of the house with glimpses of red from the trim and barns really stand out.  I remember the smaller second house for Galvin's mom which was originally the home for Sibyl and Galvin when they first got married.  I remember the bear and deer heads in the little sitting room and my favourite the beads from the hallway door to the sitting room that you had to go through during the 70's.  Yes Auntie Sibyl was modernized in the 70's!

My cousins Miles, Blaine, Brenda and Myrna were older than me and hardly around when I was there but Myrna was maybe 7 years older than me, and when she was around she spent time with me playing games they had, and if you think I can remember the one favourite we played I can't, but someone 19 years old playing with a 12 year old was amazing! I really appreciate that more now than I did when I was a kid.

I remember Miles up in the corner room with his electronic stuff soldering things and it was so cool, I was afraid to touch any of it when he was there but I sure took a close look when he was gone but never touched anything.  I still don't know what he was doing but it looked cool!

I remember the old fashioned washing machine in the basement and the ping pong table.  We had plenty of parties there too.  I remember watching my Montreal Canadiens play the New York Islanders in the playoffs one of the years in the late 70's and taking their ski-doo out one Christmas and pulling a sleigh behind it with Bruce Fleger and David and Garry Williamson on it and going all over their land, they had a trail and we had hours and hours of fun that time, and we always talked about doing it again but we never did.

I always remember Sibyl in the kitchen cooking and telling stories and talking about family and then she'd bring out the green tractor for me to play with, it moved perfectly.  You could steer it and it was the coolest thing ever.  I just like the way it seemed to float across the kitchen floor.  Galvin was either at the kitchen table or outside working on machinery or working at something and he always had a saying or funny anecdote to tell.  I loved the porch to.  I was hoping this home would stay in the family but once Sibyl and Galvin were gone, the kids rented it out for a while and finally sold it.

I was always nervous about touching things because the house was always immaculate, but they had some cool stuff.  I remember a venus flytrap, small cactus.  Like most of the Yerex family, the Burton's were and still are the nicest friendliest people I've known!