Helen Sorensen Carbine (94) passed away on Friday, March 22, 2024, surrounded by loving family members.

Helen, the second child of Erastus Mayo and Vera Petrine Anderson Sorensen, was born on Wednesday, August 14, 1929, in a small rental house in Manti, Utah. Helen arrived before the doctor came and was born without medical assistance. A local nurse arrived, and by the time Mayo returned with the town doctor, Helen was already sleeping contentedly in a box in the warm oven of the old coal stove. Her family lived in Centerfield, Cedar City, Salt Lake City, and again in Manti, Utah, during the years of the Great Depression. She loved playing outdoors, helping her mother care for her younger brothers and sisters as they arrived, and watching town sports events.

Helen attended the local public schools with her girlhood friends, many of whom remained friends for life; in her senior year of high school, she and her friends were recognized in Salt Lake City as the first ward of the church to participate in the new Golden Gleaners program, with all eight girls in her class completing the requirements. After graduating from high school, she attended Snow College in Ephraim, Utah, and her favorite subjects included biology, music, and child development. After receiving an Associate degree in 1949, Helen worked in the Salt Lake Credit Bureau for two years. In 1951, she accepted a full-time mission call to serve for two years in the Spanish-American Mission of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She shared the gospel in several towns in Texas and Las Cruces, New Mexico, and worked in the mission office in El Paso, Texas.

After her mission release in the spring of 1953, she joined her family, living in Las Cruces, New Mexico. There, she got to know her future husband, Ivan Leroi Carbine, who had just returned home to Las Cruces from his mission in England. They were married in the Manti Utah temple on June 8, 1953, and began their lives together in his college town of Las Cruces. As children arrived, Helen was very involved with caring for and raising her children. She continued her childhood pastime of reading books, taking art and ceramics classes, singing in women's vocal groups, and enjoying family excursions in the western United States and Mexico. She also served in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, teaching Sunday School, working in the Relief Society organization, helping lead girls' camps, and bringing food to people in need.

In August of 1971, Ivan passed away from gastric cancer, and Helen had to take charge of family needs and activities. So, she enrolled in New Mexico State University to earn a Bachelor's degree in English; in August 1974, she accepted a teaching position at Mayfield High School in Las Cruces to support her family financially. At Mayfield, Helen taught English classes and fulfilled other responsibilities in the English department. She loved her students, and they loved her: it was common for her to eat lunch with students in her classroom during their lunch hour. Helen navigated the family through a destructive flash house flood in 1972 and had a new house built several miles away on higher ground. During the summer months, she extended her teaching skills and received a Master's degree in Education at NMSU.

After her last child graduated from High School and after ten years of teaching in Las Cruces, in August 1984, Helen moved to central Utah for a year. Then, in May 1985, she moved to Provo, Utah, where she taught English and Rhetoric for ten more years at Pleasant Grove High School, coached the school debate team for several years, and accompanied them on competition trips. After teaching for 21 years, Helen retired from her full-time job and worked in the Provo Utah Temple for many years. She served a second church mission in Santiago, Chile, from 1998 through 1999, working in the Regional Area Office.

Helen energetically organized numerous social events during most of her life: Sunday dinners with her grandchildren and their friends, reunions with her siblings, and gatherings of old and new friends. Throughout her adult life, she was a prolific letter-writer, publishing weekly letters to her large group of descendants and friends for over 50 years. Most importantly, Helen used her creative writing skills to inspire, unify, and inform her extended family via interesting stories and thoughtful writings. She also sent birthday and wedding anniversary cards with handwritten notes to all children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and friends; between all the letters and birthday cards, she became a well-known customer at the local Post Office.

She is survived by her children Adrian (Kristine Rowley) Carbine [Utah], Charlotte (Glen) Squires [Washington], Stephanie (Pancho) Avila [Utah], Stacie Carbine [Utah], and Jeanette (David) West [Texas]. She has 24 grandchildren and 28 great-grandchildren, with six more on the way. She is also survived by her brothers, Jim (Dixie Miller) Sorensen and Paul (Margaret Clarke) Sorensen, and her sisters, Carolyn (Robert) Bessey and Joan (Joe) Shand, all living in Utah.

Helen is preceded in death by her husband Ivan Carbine, three baby children (Michael, Amy, Quinn Jay), her parents (Mayo and Vera Sorensen), her sister LaWanna Sorensen Peterson, and her brothers Gary Sorensen and Errol Rex Sorensen.

Per Helen's wishes, there will be no funeral or viewing for her. She will be interred in the Masonic Cemetery in Las Cruces, New Mexico, next to her husband Ivan.

A graveside service will be held at 10:00 a.m. at the Masonic Cemetery, 760 S. Compress Rd. Las Cruces, New Mexico, and a memorial luncheon will be held at the Miranda St. Chapel, 505 S. Miranda Street Las Cruces, at 12:00. RSVP would be appreciated.