What a beautiful celebration of life!
Two weeks ago DC resident, Geraldine McCrae, turned 105-years-old with a socially distanced birthday party. The centenarian blessed with 12 children, 42 grandchildren, 66 great-grandchildren, and four great-great-grandchildren credits her long life with her faith. She told reporters that she “trusts in God in all things.”
McCrae was born in Guyana, South America, on Jan 15, 1916. At 21, she married Frederick C. McCrae, and they decided to migrate their family from Guyana to Southeast DC in 1967. Her family has described her as loving, caring, and compassionate.
“She is a God-fearing and just one of the most caring people that I have ever known,” Orin McCrae, Geraldine’s son, told the AFRO.
The doting mother and grandmother worked as a seamstress, sewing wedding dresses, christening gowns, and bedspreads, a skill she passed down to her children and grandchildren. Her granddaughter, Candace, said her grandmother’s passion inspired her to become a baker.
“She was different from your typical grandmother,” Candace told reporters. “She spent a lot of time with us and gave us a lot of love. She had a passion for sewing and baking and crocheting, and she always tried to teach her grandchildren. She was always sharing words of wisdom with you that I would cherish forever.”
As a child, Geraldine would bake Candace a princess-style cake and say, “I don’t have any money, but this is all I can give you.” As she got older, she began to bake with her grandmother, who inspired her to start her own business, Sweet Kiss Cupcakes, “One day she just said to me to turn my passion into a profit, and that is what I did.”
McCrae told AFRO her greatest accomplishment in her life is her family, “I am very proud of my children.”
Happy Belated Birthday, Geraldine!