Erika M. Galins, 88, of Eau Claire died Tuesday, March 25, 2003 at Sacred Heart Hospital. She was born on February 21, 1915, the daughter of Roberts and Alise (Rikmanis) Lazda in Petrograd, Russia where her parents had fled from Latvia during the First World War.\r\nHer parents returned to Latvia at the end of the war and ?rika graduated from Natalija Draudzina Gimnazija in Riga and studied Law at the University of Latvia, where she met her future husband, Ernests Galins.\r\nIn 1944 ?rika fled with her family from the advancing Soviet Army and spent the next five years in refugee camps in post-war Germany. In 1949 the Galins family was sponsored by a farm family in Minerva, OH, came to the United States, and eventually settled in Canton, OH where they raised their son, Guntis and daughter, Irene. After the death of her husband Ernests, in 1975, she came to Eau Claire where she shared in the lives of her granddaughter Mara and grandsons, Andrejs and J?nis. By the vicissitudes of life, ?rika was denied the opportunity to pursue a career in law, instead she concentrated her considerable energy and talent on her passion for painting and later in life also developed an interest in ceramics.\r\nSurvivors include her daughter, Irene Galins Lazda and her husband Paulis of Eau Claire; her son, Guntis and his wife Marilyn of Granada Hills, CA; three granddaughters, Mara Lazda and her husband Roark Atkinson of Bloomington, IN, Sandra Galins of Tucson, AZ, and Linda Galins Cosgrove and her husband Gregory of Centennial, CO; two grandsons, Andrejs Lazda of New York, NY and J?nis Lazda of Washington, DC; one great-grandchild Riley Cosgrove; and a niece, Anita Apsitis of Melbourne, Australia.\r\n?rika was preceded in death by her husband Ernests; and her sister, Erna Lazda Janelsitis of Adelaide, Australia.\r\nFuneral services will be at 1 p.m. Monday, March 31, 2003 at Grace Lutheran Chapel with Dean Uldis Cepure officiating. Family and friends may call from 4 to 6 p.m. Sunday at Lenmark-Gomsrud-Linn Funeral Home and one hour prior to services Monday at the church.

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