Getting to know Lee and Twyla Strom

Greetings from Lee and Twyla Strom


  Lee has been a member of Grace since his baptism. His parents, Elof and Edna Strom were members, as were their parents. Elof was the Sunday School Superintendent and Edna directed the choir for many years. One of Lee’s fondness memories is going to choir practice when he was young and laying under the pews in the balcony and listening to the pipe organ and his love of music stems from that. Lee has always held many hats in the work field. He is a farmer at heart and could grow about anything. He also was a Real Estate broker and then spent from 2006 – 2015 in Washington D.C. working for the Farm Credit Administration, under President George Bush and President Obama. Since 2015, he has been a partner in Open Prairie Ventures. On his “off hours” you can usually find him on the tractor helping in the veggie or tending to the sweet corn fields or in his workshop.
On July 16th of this year, we celebrated our 45th wedding anniversary. We were married at the United Church of Christ in Elburn where Twy was baptized and confirmed, and shortly after that she joined the Grace family. My roots are deep at Grace as my grandparents (Dave and Florence Nelson) attended Grace back in the 30’s, when they farmed on Reed Road and then my parents (Ruth and Alfred Anderson) when they lived in Lily Lake, in the early 40’s before moving to Elburn.  After being a homemaker, I started Creative Beginnings Preschool in Elburn in 1992 and sold it in 2004 to help care for my mom. In 2014, I was asked to work at Conley Funeral Home and I’m still helping families through difficult times. When time allows, I love to have the grandkids over, be in my craft room at my sewing machine, or singing with my sisters, barbershop style!
 We have three grown children, Derek who lives in Germany, and is a physics scientist and works at the Max Planck Institute for Physics, Amber (Brandon) Ballard who lives on Middleton Road and she oversees the Vet Tech program at Burlington Central High School, and Tyler (Jacalyn) Strom, who is Executive Director of Illinois Ag food Alliance.
We also have three wonderful grandkids who keep us busy and inform us on what is important, like always having desserts on hand and time to play games. Fredrika (Rika) is 10 and will be in 5th grade, Theodon (Teddy) is 9 and is a 4th grader, Eli is almost 6 and starts his kindergarten year with Rika and Teddy paving the way and watching out for him. All will be at Lily Lake school where Lee’s dad went in 1918, Lee is the 60’s, our kids in the 80’s and 90’s and now the grandkids. Traditions are strong!
Both of us have been involved at Grace in many ways throughout the years. We have taught Sunday School, sung in the choir, been a Vision Team member, leader of VBS, Worship Committee and been regular attending members.  We are blessed to call Grace our home.

1 Comment


Nancy Corbige - June 18th, 2023 at 10:31am

This is such a wonderful story! Thank you for sharing it, and I'm glad to get to know you all better! Thank you for all of your time and work at Grace. I am grateful to now call it my church home too! God bless you! Sincerely, Nancy Corbige : )

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