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My name is Patricia Watkins; and my home country is the
United States of America
. I am currently residing in the Sultanate of
Oman, living with the most generous man in the world, two dogs and three
cats. I come from a family of
quilters, both of my grandmothers made quilts of flour sacks and scraps from
clothing. My mother, at 82, still
quilts. My fall into grace started in
Indonesia
in1983 when my friend
Ann
and I decided to each make a
king size, hand appliquéd fan quilt using the hand dyed batiks available in
Indonesia
.
Ann
is almost finished with
“The” quilt and I have mine in the frame, quilting on it. We regularly ask one another “What
were we thinking?” When the fan
quilt became to large to carry around I started making more manageable size quilts,
as I worked full time and could only piece or quilt after work or while
sitting in the car waiting for my children at their various activities I only
made hand sewn quilts for the first twenty years; baby quilts, table runners,
wall hangings, if it could fit into my purse I sewed on it. When my children grew up and no longer
needed Mom the chauffeur I started finding more time to take classes and
learn from other quilters. In 1991 we
moved to
Texas
and I discovered the Houston
Quilt Show. The quilt shop in
San Antonio
would arrange for a bus and
early on a Saturday morning off we would go for a day in wonderland. How exciting the first trip was. All these wonderful people sharing their
skills and all these shops willing to let you buy some of their wares! This was the very modest start of my
stash. BH (Before Houston) I would buy
what I needed for the project I was working on, in
Houston
I started buying just because
the fabric pleased me, now I buy because I just can’t live with out it.
In 2001 I retired as a librarian and joined my husband here in
Oman
and I was glad for my
stash. Good cotton was thin on the
ground here and finding enough for a quilt was difficult, if not
impossible. Now the shops here are carrying
a much larger inventory of cotton cloth and though the stock doesn’t
change often you can find enough to make a quilt.
While
the stock of fabric is limited here in Oman, the talent of the quilters is
world class. The Quilt Guild in Oman is small in numbers but big in
talent and I have been blessed to have had the opportunity to both take, and
teach, quilting with these ladies. I love
being in the company of other artist and I love the company of women, being with
the quilters I have both.
My color preference is for strong, bright colors, but living
here I have leant to appreciate what I can find. I enjoy both traditional and non
traditional patterns and tend to make a quilt as the sprit moves me. I never work on one project at a time, but
have many going in concert. Currently
I am working on machine quilting a double windmill, doing a Celtic appliqué
for the sampler quilt the Guild is working on, setting the inserts to the
cathedral window from a class I just took, adding a border to the Round Robin
Quilt the Guild board is working on, preparing for the class I am teaching
and hand quilting on “The” quilt.
I love the life I live and the people who populate it. The only change I would make is to have my children,
my granddaughters and distant friends nearer.
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