By: Kris Harrell

Joyce Powell has lived in Luverne for several years, and was nominated by her only daughter, Leisa Powell-Hare for The Luverne Journal’s Celebrating Moms Sweepstakes. Powell is the sweepstakes winner and exemplifies the 2024 theme, “Moms — Your first, best, forever friend.”

Powell-Hare describes her mother as someone with a servant’s heart, a mother willing to help whenever she can.

“She’s a very caring and giving mother,” Powell-Hare said. “Anything she can do for others or for me, she does. She’s a very Christian, giving and loving person, [my] mom.”

Powell-Hare was born in Troy in 1959, where Powell and her family lived for many years and where Powell navigated new motherhood.

“It was new to us, because she was the first one and only one,” Powell said. “She was always a jolly, lovely girl and she liked to be around other children.” 

Alongside going to church and spending time within the local community, Powell-Hare said her mother provided opportunities for her daughter to spend time with Powell’s parents and her Aunt Janet, Powell’s younger sister. 

“Janet played the piano, she was six and Leisa was three, and Leisa was at least five before she got her piano, because she wanted to be a pianist too,” Powell said. “We got her one, and then she didn’t want to play. I said ‘oh yes you are, because mom and dad have bought this piano and now you have to learn and play.” 

From there, Powell nurtured her daughter’s talent. She kept Powell-Hare in piano lessons in Troy, and in Luverne once they moved to the town. 

For Powell, teaching Powell-Hare about Christianity as a child was important. She continuously brought Powell-Hare to church and said she feels that teaching your children about Jesus will help them later on in life. 

“The most important thing I would say would be to teach your children about Jesus,” Powell said. “They’ve got a little soul, and that little soul is going to eternity one day and only what you’ve taught them is going to carry on to heaven. If you teach them that, they will automatically go to give love to other people, respect other people and to help other people to know about Jesus.”

Now, Powell is not only a mother, but a grandmother and great-grandmother to Powell-Hare’s children and grandchildren. 

“She always worries over us and wants to make sure we’re okay,” Powell-Hare said.  

Powell-Hare says her parenting style closely resembles the values she’s learned from her mother; worrying about her children and striving to raise them right.  

Outside of her maternal role, Powell loves gardening, tending to her flowers and vegetables, and cooking. 

“It’s been a joy to be a parent, an even greater joy being a grandparent and then a great-great joy to be a great-grandparent,” Powell said.