Winning quilt a tribute to husband

Gardnerville resident Sarah Jo McKee won the Judge’s Choice ribbon for her quilt, “A Tribute to Jim,” at the Pacific International Quilt Festival in Santa Clara, Calif., from Oct. 13-16.

Quilts entries come from throughout the world, and one must be selected to just be shown at this event.

McKee has been a member of the Carson Valley Quilt Guild for 20-plus years, currently holding the treasurer position, but has also held positions of president, national teacher, quilt show positions.

“After 10 years of serious quilting, my husband, Jim, came to me and said, ‘I know what quilt you can make for me,’” McKee said of the quilt. “I could hardly wait to have him show me what he had selected, and then … he pulls out a picture of a king sized ‘Farmer’s Wife’ quilt sewn with Civil War reproduction fabric prints. My bright loving, modern, wonky soul cringed.”

It takes 144 six-inch blocks to make a King quilt along with a whole lot of fabric.

“But this is my husband, who has been supporting me in my quilting journey,” she wrote in the quilt’s description. “No purchase was too expensive, more fabric for the stash was OK and the best tools available were what I should have. The challenge was on.”

McKee said that every road trip meant finding a shop where he could look for fabric.

“If five fat quarters was all I picked out, he added another five,” she said. “The shopping was the easy part, sewing 144 six-inch blocks took much more time.”

McKee said she started the quilt in 2010 and worked on it for almost a dozen years.

“The fabrics and design were a struggle for my soul but in 2020 it was time to complete the task,” she said. “With over 80 blocks complete and the sashing and border fabric purchased a couple years back, I was able to complete the top in 2021.”

That was the point where husband Jim’s health had started to fail, and the rush was on to find right person to complete the transformation from top to quilt.

“Our thanks go out to Teresa Silva of ‘Quilting is My Bliss’ who not only did an outstanding job quilting this monster but completed the task in a week and had it back to me in time for Jim to sit and admire the quilted quilt laid out on our bed just a week before he passed away on May 8, 2022,” McKee said. “He had said many times I was never going to complete this, but now I have this lasting Tribute to Jim.”