Annette Kay Doxsey

Annette Kay Doxsey (born Fetterer), age 63, a resident of Columbia, passed away Tuesday night, April 7, 2020 at her residence with family by her side, after being diagnosed with cancer in December.

The family will be celebrating her life with a memorial and hike in upstate New York at a later date. Heritage Funeral Home is assisting the family.

Instead of flowers, Annette would appreciate if you would carry out an unexpected and unsolicited act of kindness in her name. Her daughters are collecting memories, stories and photos from anyone who wishes to contribute to share at her memorial (Please post directly on her ‘Victorian Christmas Spiders’ Facebook page, or send to [email protected] ).

Annette was born November 5, 1956, in Glenwood, Minnesota, and was the daughter of the late Vernet Fetterer and late Iva Jacobs Fetterer. She graduated high school early and left home to become a live-in nanny in Connecticut. She would go to New York City to jazz clubs on her days off, and sometimes buy a homeless person lunch and listen to their story. She moved to California to get a technical degree in tool and die making. She moved back to Connecticut, where she worked as a machinist and met William Weber at Perkin Elmer where they both worked on the Hubble Space Telescope. Annette and Will went on to be married for many years, having one son, Luke, who passed at birth, and two daughters, Jessie and Anna. When Jessie was born, Annette launched her family daycare business, which was open for over 30 years, working 6am to 6pm five days a week and still finding time to cook homemade meals every day and garden. Through the daycare business, Annette helped raise countless children, who she loved unconditionally and cared for with the patience of a saint. She was known as “Mom-Annette” and has kept in touch with many of her kids. Annette was never one to sit still and launched several other businesses in her life. She raised and sold plants from seed every year, waking up at 4am before the daycare kids arrived to work on them. Her gardens were epic and grew to cover much of the family property. Towards the end of her career in family daycare, she began hiking in the Hudson Valley, eventually becoming a hike leader and often going on 18 mile hikes, pointing out all the different kinds of flowers and plants. She launched a new business, crafting beaded spiders, Victorian Christmas Spiders, which she continued making and selling when she moved to Tennessee to “retire” with her then-husband David Doxsey. She and David remained close and lived together for her remaining days.

Annette was fiercely proud of her daughters, artist Anna and biomedical engineer Jessie, and completely in love with her three grandchildren. She was nurturing, extremely resilient, stubborn, independent, generous, kind to everyone regardless of their background or status, an excellent cook, threw amazing Christmas parties, befriended and cared for elderly neighbors, adopted every stray animal to come near her home (the vet came to her!), smiled at all children, laughed easily and never sat still. One of her secrets was her daily nap, another was getting up early and approaching each morning as a new day. She was loved dearly by many.

Annette is survived by her daughters: Jessie (Nicolas Déplanche) of Quebec City, Canada; Anna Weber of Woodstock, New York; ex-husbands: David Doxsey and Will (Elise Lark) Weber, brothers: Doyle (DeeAnn) Fetterer; LeVerne Fetterer; sisters: Claudette (George) Frasier; Donna Fetterer, Ida (Marcus) Smith, and grandchildren: Louis Déplanche (5), Marion Déplanche (7 months), and Cole Motter (7).

Along with her parents, Annette is preceded in death by her son; Luke Weber, and half-brother; Van Christopherson.