Alifonsa's Biography

When she was 14 she and her cousin Camilla told their parents that they are going to stay over at each others houses, instead they went to a dance. It was at this dance that Alifonsa met Ramon (or Ray) Qunintana. He was getting ready to be deployed to Europe to fight in World War II; they courted for 3 years, when he returned they continued to date, most of their dates were danced and taxi rides. Alifonsa's mother liked Ray very much, her father's feelings however were a little different, at one point he even chased Ray with a shot gun. Finally, after getting both of Alifonsa's parents blessing Ray asked her if she wanted to be his wife and she accepted. On October 5th, 1946 they were married.

March 7th 1948, delivered their first child, a son, Hubert Henry Quintana, then 7 years later on November the 16th 1954 their daughter Dorothy Louise Quintana was born. At the time they lived in Las Cruces, New Mexico, Alifonsa worked at the White House Department Store and Ray worked at the White Sands Missle Range. In 1964 they moved to Palm Springs, California. Alifonsa found work at JC Penny's and Ray worked at Safeway. The years that followed found them seeing both their children graduate high school and their son Hubert met and married Lynn Kelly, whom he met in high school, on December 16th, 1967. On November 4th, 1968 the first grandchild was born, her name is Peggy. After Peggy was born Alifonsa decided that she wanted to be able to spend more time with her growning family, so she left her job at JC Penny's and started her own housekeeping business.

More grandchildren followed, Cinda was born October 28th, 1969, Ynez on January 18th, 1971, and Chico on May 25th, 1973. In 1981 their daughter Dorothy married James Avila and on October 8th, 1983 the 5th grandchild Jessica was born. Peggy became the proud mother to the first great grandchild, Cera, on August 22nd, 1984. The following year however brought some sadness to the family, when Ray passed away from heart failure in Palm Springs, on March 20th, 1985; they had been maried for 39 years. Dorothy and Jessica, who at the time were living in San Diego, moved to Palm Springs to be closer to Alifonsa, after Ray's passing. Alifonsa spent the next couple of years spending time with family and friends and in 1987 she met a man named George Matthews. He was a good man, one of their favorite places to visit was Mexico, they were together until his passing in May 1990.

March 28th, 1990 delivered the 6th grandchild, Marie, and for as much that had already happened in her life, she showed no signs of slowing down like most people her age. As always she devoted her time to her family and attended the weddings of Peggy and Ian, Cinda and Francisco, Ynez and David, and Chico and Charmin. She even was present for the birth of her second great grandchild Christian on Febrary 8th, 1996. Since then she has had many other great grandchildren, Chris, Hannah, Katie, Nick, and CJ.

In 2001 she was diagnosed with the early onset of Alzheimer's Disease, at the time not much was known about the disease, after a few years it became apparent that the disease had progressed and Dorothy and Jessica needed help taking care of her, so in 2003 they all moved to Roswell, New Mexico to be closer to Hubert. During the day Alifonsa would go to the JOY Center for a program called Adult Day Care, the program kept her busy during the day and she seemed like her old self again, laughing and dancing, having fun, and gardening. By November of 2005 the disease had progressed to a point where it was no longer safe to keep Alifonsa at home, and after much discussion between, Dorothy, Jessica, and Hubert, the hard decision to place Alifonsa in a nursing home was made. Dorothy, Jessica, and Hubert visited the local nursing homes and decided to place her in Mission Arch.

Before she was diagnosed with Alzheimer's she liked to travel and took trips to Europe, Panama, New York, Philadelphia, Virginia, and Mexico; she also enjoyed embroidering in her younger years, and she loved working in her garden.

A few things have happened since she went to the nursing home, Jessica married Justin on October 28th, 2006 and two new great grandchildren were born, Jeremy to Jessica and Justin on March 9th, 2008 and Lucas to Chico and Charmin on March 12th 2008.

As her family continues to grow, while she may not remember who we are, we will certainly remember who she is and was.