Beloved parents of seven children killed in the Surfside condo collapse

In April 2020, Chana Wasserman penned a blog post about her mom, Ingrid “Itty” Ainsworth.

Entitled “A Mother Like No Other,” Wasserman described Ainsworth, 66, as someone who was not only extremely neat and passionate about life but also extremely personable.

“Every person she encountered, ever in her life, became her friend,” Wasserman wrote. “Everyone was treated as equals. The guy at the laundromat, the guy working at the fruit market, the receptionist at the doctors office, the high school kid working at blockbuster, the seamstress, the lady doing her nails, a pigeon, the stewardess, the lady cleaning the house, the outcast, the misunderstood, the popular, the unpopular.”

Ainsworth’s ability to leave every interaction with a friend likely will be missed most as she and her husband, Tzvi, 68, were found Monday among the wreckage where Champlain Towers South once stood, according to Miami-Dade police. The news comes a dozen days after search and rescue efforts began. In the days leading up to the discovery, Deborah Phillips, the Ainsworths’ niece, remembered her aunt as a “bucket filler” on Instagram.

“She fills everyone’s bucket with an abundance of love and compliments,” Phillips wrote. “… You feel safe with her because you know she’ll only say kind words when you leave the room and be your secret keeper for life.”

The couple had seven children and moved to South Florida four years ago from Australia. Many of the seven live in Florida, including a son who had a baby in recent days, according to The Associated Press. Another son in South Africa also just had a baby.

Chabad.org described the Ainsworths as doting grandparents who were also known for their hospitality and love for helping others.

In Wasserman’s blog post, she recalled her mother’s battle with a chronic muscular disorder which left her at times bedridden due to the immense pain. The disease could’ve extinguished Ingrid’s fiery desire for life. Though there were days that the matriarch didn’t feel like her normal self, she remained a constant presence in her children’s life — even if it wasn’t always in person.

“It did take away from her physically being there,” Wasserman recalled, “but it didn’t take away from her being there for us in every other way, at any moment of any day and for that I am grateful.”

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