Kay Grabbert Neves

March 7, 1952 –  Sept. 8, 2026

Kay Grabbert Neves  passed away peacefully at her home on September 8, 2026.

She was born Janeta Kay Grabbert on March 7, 1952, in Mesa, Arizona, to Smokey and Marjory Grabbert. Since she was born during lambing season, Marj went to Arizona to be close to her family shortly before Kay was born, and then they returned home to the Grabbert Ranch in Emblem, Wyoming.

Starting when she was a toddler, Kay followed her uncle Fred Grabbert everywhere, just like his shadow, so he playfully nicknamed her “Nuisance,” which got shortened to “Nusie.” Many visitors thought that her name was Lucy. After Fred’s death, Smokey continued to call her Nusie or Nuse with much love for the rest of his life. Kay’s reunion with her Uncle Fred was no doubt joyous.

Kay went to the one room schoolhouse in Emblem through the eighth grade, graduated high school in Greybull and then graduated college at BYU.

She married her high school sweetheart, Dave Neves, and worked as a home economics teacher for a year before their children were born, where she served rattlesnake sandwiches to the unsuspecting kids to get them to stop raiding the fridge in her classroom.

When Kay and her brother Dave Grabbert decided to pursue their ranching businesses separately in 1996, Kay and her husband Dave named their ranch the 7K Ranch, where they continued breeding their legacy Ramboullet sheep. Bankers were initially reluctant to give her ranch an operating loan, and eventually she learned they did it as a long-term family favor, and then her loan was one of the best managed loans on their books.

The 7K Ranch thrived under her care. Kay was extremely meticulous at record keeping, and her paper filing system was a sight to see – although it was fairly intimidating to help her with that filing, and it became a true labor to pack around the boxes as the years progressed. 

At lambing time when she walked through the sheds, she could tell when a lamb needed extra help or when the ewe’s feed needed adjusted by looking at them. She made lunch every single day for her workers during lambing season so that they could focus on the sheep.

Kay was an innately curious person, who instilled an interest in learning to everyone around her. She was a woman of many talents – sewing, knitting, quilting, crosstitching and cooking, and she even found time to watch TV during some of those hobbies. 

She kept herself busy in the community, where she was president of the Wyoming Wool Growers, a CARES board member, a Wyoming Livestock board member, a Big Horn County Predator board member and a member of her faith community and worked at the Greybull Valley Irrigation District, where she learned how to understand water rights and the value of water, which helped her farm and ranch a great deal. She also regularly donated to the library, CARES, 4-H and FFA, and at graduation she gave money to every high school graduate in Burlington and Emblem.

She loved her community and was proud to be part of the Grabbert family legacy. She was always incorporating new developments into her ranching such as the Bud Williams low stress livestock handling techniques, and she partnered with the University of Wyoming researchers on sheep projects.

Kay advocated for doing the right thing even if it occasionally made her a bit of a rabble-rouser. She was a fiercely loyal super mom, raising her four children through severe postpartum and ongoing depression. She always took time to teach community members and her nieces and nephews life skills during the summer. 

When her children were growing up, she kept them active with 4-H. She taught her girls, as well as several nieces, nephews and other children her sewing skills. Her perfectionism helped them develop a close relationship with a seam ripper. Kay was proud to enter her intricate quilts at the fair, where she won many ribbons. 

She and the other Emblem moms showed their eagerness to embarrass the neighborhood kids by having them dress up as cows and sing about Emblem crops being “mighty fine” in the local summer parades. Kay was a true Emblemite and remained active in keeping the quarterly Emblem community events alive.

Kay took great pride in her self-sufficiency and loved lively debates. The last few years were difficult as frontal temporal dementia took away her ability for both. 

Kay was preceded in death by her parents, Marjory Foote Grabbert and Smokey Grabbert, and brothers Joel Grabbert and Jay Grabbert. 

She is survived by her brother, Dave Grabbert; husband Dave Neves; children Mike (Amanda) Neves, Kristin (Parry) Beasley, Megan Foote and Hali Neves (Ishan Aditya); grandchildren Delaney, Cienna (James), Joel (Clara), Ember, Sylvan, Fritz, Aspen and Sloan; and one great-granddaughter, Blair.

One of her favorite phrases was, “Well, damn, damn, double damn, triple damn, cuss.” And that’s how we feel right now.

Visitation with the family will start on September 19 at 9 a.m. at the Burlington Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints chapel, and the service will begin at 10 a.m. Interment will follow at the Emblem Cemetery, followed by a luncheon at the church.

Haskell Funeral Home in Lovell has been entrusted with her funeral arrangements. 

In lieu of flowers, the family prefers donations go to Stillwater Hospice at https://www.thegracefundfoundation.com/donate. They showered Kay with amazing care for a little over a year, which gave great comfort to her and her family.