A compassionate and loving mother, a devoted and patient partner, a sister, daughter, auntie, and friend of many; faith-follower, community-supporter, and passionate writer who lived in honesty, curiosity, openness, and care for helping others.
Mali wholeheartedly enjoyed the simple things in life—mostly exploring the PNW with her cat, Clyde, and dog, Ezra. She was active in church as both a member and staff during times of residing in Minneapolis and Portland. Mali was a big dreamer who often brought her dreams to life through vision and purpose. She had much gratitude and thanks for the gentle gift of life and deeply felt in her heart, and often reminded herself and others, that life is not guaranteed. Therefore, she honored spending time with the ones she loved and doing the things that she dreamt of, while finding beauty in connection and light during darkness.
Mali truly felt connected with the Holy Spirit, Angels, and Mother Universe. If you knew her, you know how much she believed in Angel Numbers—declaring “Bless Up” while signaling the cross over her body when seeing them. She truly felt she was being guided by a higher source. Anytime she visited spiritual and aura readers or reiki masters, they would all say one thing for certain—she always had angels sitting on her shoulders. She was guided in life and the unknown by her strong faith and trusting heart. When she moved to Portland in 2021 with her cat, leaving behind her entire family, career, friends, and foundation, journeying into the unknown, and being asked, “Why’d you move to Portland?” she would say, “I’m just following my heart.” Mali had three life goals in mind when moving to Oregon: rescue a dog, learn how to surf, and ride a motorcycle. Mali rescued her pup three months after arriving, joined the motorcycle community that spring through Saturday morning walks up to her local coffee shop/moto café with Ezra (shout out to See See’s), and started surfing that summer with Babes on Waves. Some would say Mali was the spark plug to the engine, or the doer of the group. She always went after what she wanted and never gave up on what she believed in.
Mali lived an active life and enjoyed skiing, running, hiking, biking, motorcycling, thrifting, playing pickleball, meeting new people, going to the dog park, foraging mushrooms, combing shorelines, collecting driftwood, meditating, journaling and writing, visiting the coast, learning to surf, and calling friends and family back home while sipping her morning coffee. She often said the C as her middle initial stood for “Cozy”—wherever she lived, she loved to make her home cozy and safe for herself, her partner, and their animals. She sincerely strived to ensure wherever she was, everyone felt seen, heard, welcomed, loved, and comfortable.
Mali’s final dream was to own multiple properties with her partner—effortlessly yet simply living and floating between Portland, Bend, and Baja with their animals; traveling routinely back to MN to visit her side while spending closer days and nights with his side. She often shared she dreamed of living off the land, in a treehouse where she didn’t collect mail yet was reachable by phone or visits. She would finally press “launch” on her partnerships consulting company and live out her vocation of bridging the connection and relation between churches, nonprofits, small businesses focused on health and wellness, and community.
For Mali, family and love were everything—that’s all she ever felt she fully needed. With that, she knew she had it all. Mali was a source of comfort, acceptance, and peace. She sometimes had her own versions of words, but she didn’t care; she was uniquely herself, and she felt she could fully be her most authentic self in the city known for acceptance: Portland.
Mali’s motto was: be you, be true. And if we can all live by one quality of Mali’s, it’s to love greatly.
