The Eversley Rest Home and Village resident's actual birthday is on Monday but she is having four days of celebrations to mark such a big milestone and has already received many cards and flowers from well-wishers.
Her daughter, Myra Bowman, who came especially from Te Kuiti for the occasion, said today's celebration was the start of the festivities with a five-piece band playing for her at the retirement village tomorrow, a family lunch on the actual day and a high tea at Eversley on Tuesday.
"She will be exhausted but it's lovely to be able to celebrate it with her."
Her family are proud of her and she has kept pretty good health, although her eyesight is not what it used to be, Mrs Bowman said.
Mrs Bowman worked out online that her mother would be 36,524 days old on Monday, which is pretty impressive.
Mrs Trotter was born in Whanganui on August 21, 1917, as one of six children and moved with her family to Hastings when she was about 18 months old.
She grew up on an orchard her father bought off a Chinese market gardener on Kaiapo Rd.
In her early 20s, while a house keeper on a farm in Hawke's Bay, she met her husband Jim who was working there and had cut his hand which she bandaged.
They married four weeks after Mr Trotter returned home from World War Two and had three children - Mrs Bowman, Gordon Trotter, of Hastings, and Alexandra Werner (who lives in California and could not make the celebration).
The family has now grown to include six grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren.
The devoted mother and churchgoer has spent most of her life in Hawke's Bay and moved to Eversley Rest Home and Village a few years ago.
