Heather, I know you are back and that you bought a new machine, but what is it and can you post photos? What else did you buy? We are all curious.

So happy to hear you have chosen your new machine. What fun awaits you.

Congratulations on your new machine and I can understand it will be hard to wait until you can take your lessons and pick it up.

Superior Threads had a special on for I think it was US $9.50 for 100 bobbins, and yes as suggested you always have some left on the bobbins and its just a waste of thread to keep having to pull the threads off bobbins so you can use it for another colour, I bought a pack and we shared it among sewing friends.

Margo, Rosemary and Rita said it all

Reetzbobeetz wrote:
oh, yes, sorry; she's giving it to me. She is a very dear, dear friend and doesn't use it (she has a different machine, or this is a spare, or I"m not sure exactly but anyway, she told me "I have the free motion foot, don't buy that..." b/c she's sending it to me! Yay!!!

I am so beyond excited it's not even funny!!!!

Hi Heather, this is great news! I have a question? When you say a friend has the free motion foot, do you mean that she is going to let you have it? For keeps? If not, you should get your own as you will definitely need it too often to be borrowing. I agree about the open toe applique foot and also the bobbins. Good luck with your purchase.

PosyP wrote:
*that* is a very good tip! Okay, will do! I had thought 4 would be plenty, but as I often have multiple projects going at once, yes, the more the merrier. And at only $6 for 10, I can do that!

For ex, right now I have:
-baby quilt (purple thread)
-my son's quilt (gray thread) (but will use red for part of it)
-my diary quilt (white/cream)
-my Brazil quilt (well, not started, but soon....) (will need cream/beige in places, but something else, maybe blue?, in others....)

Not to mention the little random things I do here & there, such as:
-ipad cover for my husband (green thread)
-collar slip-cover for our new puppy (blue thread)
-placemats for our table (some bright color, not sure yet)

and so forth & so on. So, yes, bobbins so they can have different colors w/o me having to unload -- brilliant!! I would *never* have thought of that. Thank you!!

Any other "this is so common sense, everyone knows it" kind of tips, because honestly, I so don't know those things??

So glad for you, to have sorted out your machine challange. I hope you have many happy hours together.

By the way, I would definitely recommend getting extra bobbins (christmas presents?), otherwise you will find that you are stripping spare thread off a nearly full bobbin because it is the wrong colour - personally I always keep one for black and one for white/cream and then let the rest change colour as needed, but then I also do a lot of clothes alterations.

Congratulations! Have a wonderful trip. I agree with Margo.

Congratulations Heather!
I would recommend an open toe applique foot if you plan to do machine applique.

You are going to have a ball!!

Picked out my sewing macine!!!!

Many thanks to all of you who replied with ideas on this!!! I'm so excited!

I go to TX in August for our annual US trip to see family, and while there will buy a Janome Magnolia 7318 from my "local" quilt shop who is also a certified Janome dealer.

I picked this one because:
-so many of you said Janome was a good brand
-I can *very easily* get Janome brand serviced here in Brazil (or buy extra feet, etc...), in my actual city, not hours away
-I have roughly $250 to spend w/o going over-budget, and of the 3 machines the dealer suggested, this was the best

I will *probably/maybe* go ahead and get the quilting kit (1/4" foot, walking foot w/guide, cloth guide?, open toe free motion foot, open toe applique foot) as well. Well, a friend has the free motion foot, so I'll buy the other bits separately. Plus it comes with a roughly 2 hour intro class, which I am excited about! He said about a 45 min. machine intro, and then another hour/hour & a half more in depth class with their "professional sewist"

I know it doesn't have all the features that would be nice, but I really cannot go over that price; at least, not and still have $$ to buy fabric with.

So very looking forward to learning my new machine!!! I have about 6 or 7 wks until I pick it up, and I can barely stand the wait!!!

Oh -- the point, LOL! -- I am covered on needles, it comes with 4 bobbins (do I need the pack of 10 extra for $6?), I will get the feet listed above in the quilting kit, and keeping in mind I am just about maxing out my budget, is there anything else I need to get right away for the machine? It comes with a zipper foot, a button-hole foot, a regular foot + I will buy 1/4 inch foot & walking foot (do I need the applique foot???). Anything else that is "must have" from day one of using a machine??? For a "never has used a machine before in her life" but Intermediate hand piecer/quilter????

Thanks again, all! Hopefully I will love this new machine!!

Hope I'm not covering old ground here

FYI, I have a friend who couldn't get her NEW machine to stitch with decent tension. (She'd bought it and let it sit for a year, until I invited her to sew with me.) She set tension to 0, and STILL not enough. I looked at the manual with her, when we threaded it. The store she bought the machine at was out-of-business. So, she took her machine in to my favorite dealer/service center and they discovered that she'd/we'd been threading the machine wrong (even though she was looking at the manual when she did it at home). They showed her how to thread it, and it was fine after that. She's in her late 50's, and had sewn a lot when she was younger, so sewing was not a new thing to her.

Just goes to show, some instruction is SO useful. Hmmmm, have you searched for YouTube videos on threading, etc, your machine? Since you live so far from the dealer/service center? If Bernina's many many videos don't cover your machine, I'll bet you can email the company with your model number, and ask which newer models (more likely to have videos) are threaded the same way.

Good luck! It sounds like your used Bernina is a lot more valuable than $250, so I hope you'll be able to use it!

pigtailpat wrote:


Thanks, Pat. In August I will only be in the US to visit for a few weeks; I'm hoping to spend no more than $250 for a machine while there. I am looking at Janome brand, for a few reasons. One, the local quilt shop I visit when in the US is a Janome dealer, so I'd be able to buy from them and get an intro class while there. Two, the local shops here use Janome and the machine repair places carry & service Janome without me having to drive nearly 2 hours (maybe more) to the single Bernina dealer in Brazil.

I plan to hang on to the Bernina 1020 and get it fully serviced when I'm in the US for good, but that is likely to be several years from now, thus why I need something sooner rather than later. And because I'm a little "gun-shy" at the moment, I'm planning to stick with new rather than vintage, used, etc.

If you will be back in the US in August and staying back permanently, just bide your time and hold onto that bernina (will it work on our voltage system here? ). Get the machine fixed and back up and running here.

The singer featherweight (original) while she's a cute little thing and I have one myself, it's a piecing machine only - her feed dogs don't drop, and since you are so new to quilting, I feel you would be frustrating yourself to attempt to quilt with it - especially a large quilt. It's a great piecing machine, no question about that. But if you want to quilt a top, there are other ways to do it.

A better choice, a machine with more power and still a 3/4 head is the singer 301. I have that machine as well, and it is a powerful, fast machine in compact size (bigger than featherweight, but not a full size). The feed dogs drop on the 301.

Once you get back to the US and if you are staying permanently, and can do a cabinet situation, another possibility is the 15-91. Great machine.

However, the problem with all of the vintage machines is that for top quilting (and by that I mean the sewing process of the top, batting and back), is that you must manually tie off your stitching to secure the stitches so they do not become undone. I love my vintage machines for their stitch ability, but, because I can basically sew only 1 day a week, I found the time involved in securing my stitches extremely a drag. I know you can backstitch, and have used that in combination with bringing up the bobbin thread both at the beginning and ending of the stitch. It still is alot of time.

I spent a year investigating a modern machine and settled on bernina. The difference is tremendous. So when you get back to the US in August, investigate possibly a more modern bernina if your finances allows it. If not, any of the vintage singers I mentioned are great things to look at for little money. I got one 301 off craigslist for $40, one for $25. Sometimes you can get really cool deals. The 301 fits in my camera backpack for airline travel, and it's a pretty good class machine.

Pat