Leanne Faherty

February 20, 1957 – January 3, 2004

Submitted by Margaret Hale, mother

Leanne was born in Minneapolis on February 20, 1957. She grew up in Fridley where she attended, and graduated from, Grace High School. She was the youngest of Margaret and Joe’s three children. Her older brothers are Mark and John. Her father passed away when she was six years old and her mother later married Bob, a man Leanne loved dearly.

She studied fashion and design at Lowthian College, and finance and accounting at the University of Minnesota. A wonderful opportunity presented itself and she spent four years in New York City in the financial field before returning to Minnesota where she excelled in business and became a director of two business schools, which became her passion.

In 1990, she married Jim and together they had a son, Bobby, in 1992. Her greatest joy was spending time with Bobby, especially planning his birthday parties and other holiday festivities.

She had such a tender heart and a great capacity to love. When she was little she loved playing with her Barbie dolls and during the summer enjoyed capturing insects, being careful not to hurt them, gently placing them in Mason jars, which would line the family’s breezeway.

The sequins on the quilt square are from a calendar project she worked on with her mother when she was 11 years old, after her father’s death. The sequins have been saved all these years until the quilt project gave them a purpose. The irony is that Leanne’s son Bobby had just turned 11 as Margaret completed the square, the same age as Leanne as she worked on the calendar with her mother so many years before.