My sewing machines

Sewing and knitting have always been my main hobbies throughout my life. There have been periods when I would go many months between using a sewing machine but as far as I can remember I have always owned one.  I have made lots of clothes, curtains, pillow cases, done repairs and even tried sewing leather. The latter was not a success!

Likewise with my knitting, sometimes I have gone years without using a machine. I haven't always had a knitting machine, circumstances and moving countries twice have dictated that.

Now, however I am lucky to have three knitting machines and three sewing machines. (technically four sewing machines but one has been relegated to storage as it is pretty old and outdated.)

Actually, my three usable ones are old compared to today's standards too.  The newest one is 18 years old lol.

Here are pictures of the three I have in the house.  I go through phases of using them.  At the moment I am into the Singer.

My Singer, the newest machine and it is 18 years old!

I haven't really used this one much.  I bought it with me from Canada.  It was a Christmas gift in 1996.  I worked full time back and was involved in various different things like theatre and my son's sports so didn't have much time for sewing.  When I came to the US I had the use of my mother in law's machine.  It was a bit fancier albeit older than mine and has a bigger range of stitches.  I used it but mainly for plain sewing.  I never really got into the fancy stitches.

My mum in law's machine.  A Brother Pacesetter XL 703.  Guess technically it's mine now as she passed away four years ago.

I used this one for some time but it started to break the thread so I set it aside and got my Singer back out.  Then wham! it stopped working.  We took it to a repair guy and he said it was the foot pedal that had quit and he had an old one hanging around so it was working again but it had lost it's speed.  Obviously the foot pedal wasn't fully compatible with the motor but at least it was working.

Not long after we were at an auction and a Brother came up for sale.  It is pretty basic so we took a chance and bought it for $15.  It's a great little workhorse and very fast so great for sewing curtains and anything with a lot of plain sewing.

The auction $15 Brother special

So I had been using this one forever but decided a couple of weeks ago to get my other machines out to check they were OK.

I had been checking out machines in the store.  I can't help myself.  I have a thing about sewing and knitting machines. Today's machines have so many more functions than any of mine.  I have to be realistic though as to how often I would use said functions!  Hence the reason for getting my other machines out.  Maybe I could still get fancy stitches without    buying a new machine.

My mum in law's machine, the Pacesetter, still snapped the thread so it got cleaned up and put back.  It does do some nifty stitches though and it got me wanting even more to do more than just plain sewing and ordinary ziz zag.

So then out came the Singer.  After messing with the Pacesetter I had a better idea as how to make different stitches by varying the stitch length and width.  I also found out that after the initial slow start it speeds up so it my preferred machine right now.

Here is some of my 'playing' on the Singer.  It also does great button holes and can apparently sew buttons on too but I haven't tried that yet.

Just prior to all the machine experiments I made a Christmas bag for our newest grandson.  Think I made it on the Brother auction special but not sure. I hand stitched his initial onto it.  In hindsight I wish I had waited and used the Singer to fancy stitch it on but such is life.   

Will I be able to resist buying another sewing machine?  Who knows, they are pretty cheap so after Christmas and property taxes who knows what the new year will bring?

I am also looking to buy a sewing machine for our youngest grand daughter. That has been a challenge.  She is only 7 so I think that she just needs a basic machine. After a lot of looking I think I have found a Singer she would like. It's a Singer Pixie.  It's main redeeming feature is that it is purple, her favourite colour. It is a craft machine so is smaller than a regular machine.  Perfect for smaller hands.  Only problem is the reviews are mixed, some people love it and say it works great and some hate it and say it doesn't work well at all.   I don't want to put her off sewing for good by giving her a machine that doesn't work too well but on the other hand we have a budget for Christmas gifts and this falls within it.  Still have a little time to think about it.  The good reviews outweigh the bad.

What I've been up to the past three weeks.

Well, I made the belt for my son's birthday but in my haste to mail it off to him in England I forgot to take photos! (a recurring theme I'm sorry to say).  I have asked him to take a couple and email them to me. Time will tell on that one lol, he is a busy young man.

My husband wanted a hat and neck warmer for when he is outside so I made him these on the Studio 700 using the ribber.  Straight forward

1 x 1 rib.  He can pull the neck warmer up to just under his eyes so his face keeps nice and warm when he is outside.

So after making the above he wanted some mittens but with one finger for his index finger so he could work in them out in the shop.  Well, that one got me stumped as I didn't want to hand knit them and was clueless as to how to do them on the machine.  Then I had a brain wave!!!!!

I made a black tube on the machine in 1 x 1 rib and using the same yarn as for the hat and neck warmer.  I gathered the top and sewed it up and left two holes so he could wear black magic gloves underneath and poke his thumb and finger through the holes.  Voila! mittens with an index finger and thumb made very simply.  The magic gloves even have special tips so that he can use his cell phone and tablet wearing them.  Magic gloves are so cheap here, only $2 a pair for the ones with the special tips and two pairs of the normal ones for $1.50. Why on earth would I knit them when I can buy them that cheaply?  With the extra tube layer if it gets too cold he can just bring his thumb and finger inside the mitten.  We are having bitterly cold weather right now, well below freezing so the hat, gloves and neck warmer are getting well used.

I have also done some sewing but that is for another post, perhaps tomorrow........