Cheryl Christine (Parrish) Bornkessel, age 68, of Overland Park, KS, formerly of Great Bend, KS, passed away on June 25, 2019.

Funeral services will be on July 3 at 2:00 pm in the Church of the Resurrection’s Wesley Covenant Chapel. Friends, family, and former students are invited to join with reception to follow. The family welcomes flowers and/or donations to American Cancer Society.

Mrs. Cheryl Bornkessel, 68, was born on February 17, 1951, in Great Bend, Kansas, to become the oldest of three siblings. At the early age of 5, she was already honing her skills in conversation and friendship, going house-to-house making social visits. This call for building relationships would only continue as she grew up participating in dance through ballet and point, worked as a lifeguard at the community pool, and graduated from Great Bend High School in 1969.

Cheryl attended the University of Kansas, where she joined the Alpha Chi Omega sorority and became Social Chair while she earned her Education Degree. It was there she met Robert (Bob) Bornkessel who she later married in 1973.

She served as an elementary teacher for 38 years in Hickman Mills, Center, and the Blue Valley School Districts. She retired in 2015.

Cheryl was known for her abundance of energy, encouraging spirit, selflessness, contagious laughter, and love for children. She was a mother to Brett Andrew (1979), Brooke Nicole (1981), and Blake Anthony (1983). She considered being Mimi to her four grandchildren as her life’s greatest role. Always social and service-minded, she actively volunteered with Church of the Resurrection, the Overland Park Arboretum and was a member of Johnson County Young Matrons. She was an avid reader and believed in the power of love, as best expressed through action.

She is preceded in death by her parents, Robert Ambrose Parrish and Mary Belle (Polly) Parrish, and her son, Brett Andrew, whom passed at 4-months old.

Survivors include her husband Bob; two siblings, Cindy (Parrish) Viskocil of River Falls, WI and Robert Parrish of Lawrence, KS; her two children Brooke (Bornkessel) Kunstman of Olathe, KS, and Blake Anthony of Bentonville, AR and their spouses Matthew Kuntsman and Alexandra (Rampy) Bornkessel; and her four grandchildren Brayden Matthew (12), Lukas Michael (11), Kiersten Nicole (4), and Scott René (2), many family members, and a host of friends-like-family.