Betsy Joanne Stauffer, 87, of Lititz, passed away Wednesday surrounded by family at Ephrata Hospital after a 50-plus-year battle with diabetes partially brought on by her love of cookies.  Stauffer was a homemaker by trade, raising six well-adjusted children and providing loyal companionship to the love of her life, the late Jay Thomas “Tom” Stauffer, with whom she celebrated 59 years of marriage.  The couple worked as a team, with Tom toiling in the basement of their home on his celebrated pewter business and Betsy running a vacuum cleaner at all hours of the day, cooking meals of Spam with cloves and brown sugar and making sure her children didn’t break too many bones.  Betsy would later join her husband in her own artistic endeavors, creating reed baskets and elaborate pins made of antique buttons, coins and watch parts, selling them at craft shows like the Kutztown Folk Festival and the Waterford Fair in Virginia.  “Bets,” as she was affectionately known, was fabled in the Lititz community for her ability to weave a tale about her life and town, or to track down the latest juicy gossip. She was also known by her other nicknames, including “Blackie,” “Coot-Coot,” “The Battleship,” and her least favorite, “The Driving Force. ”  The “Queen of Malapropisms,” Betsy was prone to routinely misremembering the names of famous people, calling musician Jackson Browne “Black Jackson,” and confusing “internets” terms like Twitter, tweets and blogs as “twickles, tweeters and blobs. ” She once referred to an Uber ride as an “Hombre. ”  A great shopper and spender of money, Betsy enjoyed buying glitzy clothes to fill the spare room she used as a walk-in closet, collecting broaches from the Joan Rivers Classics Collection and dozens of Mary Frances purses.  Although not known for her cooking prowess, Betsy did enjoy eating numerous meals, including oysters, ribeye steaks, shrimp, lobster, pretzels, potato chips, popcorn, and her favorite, Maryland blue crabs. She loved sitting at the kitchen table in her cottage in Saxis, Va. , picking fresh crabs as efficiently as a professional crab picker. Her daily breakfast consisted of a banana, a cup of coffee with lots of half and half, and a rotating list of baked goods.  Betsy was a 1953 graduate of the former Lititz High School where she played the glockenspiel in the band. After high school, she worked as a phone operator for D&E Telephone and as a receptionist at the Wilbur Chocolate Factory and the former Animal Trap Co. in Lititz before marrying Tom on his return from the Navy.  Born in Lititz, she was the daughter of the late Lester Haines and Minerva Smith Haines.  Surviving are three daughters: Kathy, married to Michael Yoder of Liberty, Ky. , Sue, married to Ray Leed, and Debra, married to Brad Eidemiller, both of Lititz; three sons, Jay Thomas, married to Cindy Stauffer, and Jeffrey, married to Vickie Stauffer, both of Lititz, and David Stauffer of Redstone, Colo. , formerly married to Stacie Stauffer of Harwich, Mass. ; 13 grandchildren; three step-grandchildren; 10 great-grandchildren; and a brother, Lester Haines Jr. of Leroy. Betsy spent the last four years of her life living with her oldest grandson, Michael Jr. , and his wife, Lindsey Yoder, who served as her primary caregiver.  She was preceded in death by a sister, Bonita “Bonnie” Swinehart.  A memorial service will be held at 2 p. m. on Sunday, June 19, at Trinity Baptist Church, 653 W. Newport Rd. , Lititz.

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Betsy Stauffer Obituary | Cremation Services of Pennsylvania