UNIQUE QUILT FEATURES FAMILY PHOTOS

The quilt features photos of both sides of the Beard family. Jackson USA Signal Photo Mark Evans

Ella Mae Beard will not have to dig out photo albums or pull framed photos down from the wall to show visitors family photos. All she will have to do is unfold a quilt.

The Jackson resident completed a most unusual quilt this summer. In addition to the traditional scraps of cloth and fine stitching, it features photos of the extended Beard-Thorn families.

"I just kind of thought it up," she said. "It was something I wanted to do."

Donna Terry took a number of Beard's family photos and scanned them into a computer. Using a special cloth with peel-off paper on the back (costing $2 a sheet), she was then able to print out the photos directly on the cloth, which was then sewed onto the quilt. This gives is more permanence and better clarity than iron-on applications.

Barbara Mitchell hand-quilted around the photos, which took about three months of the eight-month process.

"I enjoyed working on it," Beard said. "I was pleased with the way it turned out when I got it finished."

Beard has quilted about 20 years, but primarily does pattern quilts.

"Just about every year the kids and grand kids can expect quilts," she said.

The quilt includes photos of her parents, Herbert and Iva Thorn, as well as her brothers and sisters. Her husband Ken's parents, Melba and Bill Beard, and his brothers and sisters are also pictured. So are the couple's five children, Ronnie, Brenda (Ates), Don and Linda, and grandchildren Melissa, Billy, Rhonda, Christian and Jessica, Jennifer and Josh.

Photos of past family homes as well as the covered bridge at Bollinger Mill in Burfordville (where the Thorn family lived) are also on the brightly-colored quilt.

The quilt has been a big hit everywhere.

"I took it to show my mother in Jackson Manor and I think everyone that was able to look at it, looked at it," Beard said. "I also have an 87-year-old aunt who said she hoped she lived to see it. That got me on the ball."

The children and grandchildren need not look for this quilt under the Christmas tree anytime soon, though. It's staying at Beard's home for the foreseeable future.

"Of all the quilts I've made over the years, this is the only one I have," she said. "I'm holding onto it!"