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Jan
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Hi, my name is Jan Duncan. I hail from Suffolk in the UK and have been in Dubai for over 12 years now. Married to Dave with daughter Zoe and son Richard who both still live with us in Al Barsha. During my time in Dubai I have tried various different crafts such as dress making, pattern making, water colour painting , embroidery and card making just to name a few. My biggest passion was cross stitching until a few years ago when Zoe bought me a quilting book along with some lessons as a Christmas present. That was it – I caught the bug and it has been quilting for much of my spare time since then. I had some lessons in the basics from Marriane Sheldon and shortly after, I made my first ‘Fans Set on Point’ quilt. It was quite a tricky first quilt but I was delighted when it won ‘best first quilt’ in the 2003 guild show at Nad Al Sheba. That summer I took it home and gave to my parents who were delighted and it is on their bed all year round. With that first encouragement it was onwards and upwards and I have since made many more quilts that I have given as presents for one occasion or another. I have taken several classes with the visiting teachers and really enjoyed making a blue and lilac lap quilt ‘Faux Pineapple with Di Wells’ for my favourite aunt that has Alzhiemers. She was delighted with it and doesn’t want to mess it up so has put it at the foot of her bed, bless her. This quilt was one of Mala’s first quilts and she did a great design. The selection of material in Dubai is tremendous and I have accumulated quite a stock so I just need some more spare time to turn them into quilts. Difficult to get spare time in Dubai !. When I stitch at my Bernina I usually have an audience of two cats, Misty and Maramalade who have to get into the material and make themselves comfy. It is a bit frustrating at times but they are great company when I am working on a long project during the day. No doubt you may spot a few hairs on the one I may enter in the show, if it gets finished on time. My preference of quilt style is for the more traditional quilting but I love to admire all types. There are many very talented quilters locally as well as elsewhere in the Middle East and the quilting guild does a great job of bringing many different nationalities and cultures together. It is not difficult for me to see that those introduced to this craft get bitten so easily. My ambition is to make a double wedding ring quilt for our bed as I just love this design. A few weeks ago I decided to have a go at curved piecing. Betty Cochran showed me the ‘easy’ way and I took a pattern from the internet called ‘many paths’. I enjoyed the curves although they were a bit tedious. The top is pieced and pinned, ready for quilting so I need to do a bit more practicing with the machine quilting as I haven’t quite mastered it as well as I want to. Just one more thing to do in all the spare time I can find. At the moment I am looking forward to all the appliqué on the BOM. This project has been a great learning curve for me and I thoroughly recommend all you quilters out there to ‘have a go’ next year. Happy
quilting to you all!
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