I am joining Sarah@Confessions Of A Fabric Addict who has hosted Hands2Help for the last 10 years. This is my third year of participating in this comfort quilt challenge where quilts are made for worthwhile charities (such as those who distribute quilts to hospice patients, people undergoing chemotherapy, and children in the foster care system). Last year Sarah added an option to make a quilt for a deserving individual recipient, and I made a quilt for my longtime friend, Jeanne Wilkins, for the Hands2Help 2020 Caregivers Quilt Initiative. Please see my 50 Years of Friendship Quilt post to learn more about my amazing friend and the quilt I made for her. This year Sarah has included another individual recipient category and that is for Hometown Heroes who have made a difference during the COVID-19 pandemic. I decided to make a quilt for my friend, Kathy Bibinoff, who I met over 40 years ago in my hometown (the suburbs of Sacramento, CA).

Kathy is one of the strongest people I know. She’s definitely been through horrendous adversity but is still able to maintain a positive attitude. Kathy is a 10-year cancer survivor.  She met her husband, Mike, shortly after her own cancer went into remission, and they had a lovely romance that culminated in a happy and supportive marriage. Sadly Mike passed away from cancer in 2019. This past August, Kathy’s mother, Millie, died of Alzheimer’s disease at age 90. Kathy was so devoted to her mom and when I visited the Sacramento area in 2016, I was able to see how loving and patient she was with Millie.

Below are a couple photos of Kathy and her husband, Mike.

And here are some pics of Kathy with Millie. I especially like the second one with their heads together.

Kathy is also an awesome mother. Her 27-year-old daughter, Rachel, graduated from Montana State in Bozeman with a Biological engineering degree. Rachel lives in Manhattan, NY, and works for Nacco. She often goes into hospitals and tests water exiting the hospital for contaminants. Here is a lovely photo of Rachel:

Like so many teachers, this past year was particularly challenging due to teaching remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic, which was basically twice the amount of work. Kathy is in her 34th year of teaching. She teaches 7th and 8th grade math and Algebra 1 as her primary classes.  She also teaches an art elective that introduces drawing, pottery and mixed media. Kathy has always gone the extra mile with her students. After receiving my quilt, Kathy was inspired to write a math project where she asked her students to make a quilt square they liked with black and neon paper. They then were asked to calculate the area of each shape added and then the percent the neon shapes took of the black space. How cool is that!?! (But please don’t ask me to do that!) Below is a pic of her students black and neon paper quilt squares:

Kathy is also devoted to her dogs. Here is a pic of the quilt I made for her with Mandy and Rocco.

If you’d like to read more about the quilt I made for Kathy, please see To-Do #3 of this post. I retitled this quilt, Pond, after Frédérique made a comment about this post and referred to it as my Pond quilt. That sounds much better to me than Magic Carpet.

I hope you enjoyed getting to know my good friend and hometown hero, Kathy. I’m so happy to recognize her and all she has overcome and accomplished.

Linking up to Hands2Help 2021 Hometown Heroes.