"So what did you get up to this week-end?"
"I cleaned my apartment."
"Ah, head start on spring cleaning?"
"Um, no, actually." Slight pause, "My cat was ill."
"So it threw up every where?'
Slightly awkward pause. "Other end."
"oh."
"Hey can you tell this story next time my girlfriend's around? She wants a cat."
Monday, April 14, 2008
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Clackety-Clack
Recently I have begun to wonder about getting a new machine. Mine keeps going on the fritz - not enough to warrant going out and buying a new machine but rather just enough to make you start pondering the possibility. I believe that most machines have a slight temperament. It takes a while to know what your machine will and will not do. You soon learn that before sewing certain types of fabric, you need to take a deep breath, close your eyes and hope for the best.
Apparently though, sewing machines have advanced since I bought mine. I've had mine a few years now. Yesterday, I went and investigated some new machines.
I learned that electronics are big. No longer do they use turn dials where you can hear the machine clicking into place - it's quietly done by the electronic dial or buttons. Some machines come with a needle threader. It will automatically thread your needle for you. I can thread my machine's needle faster and with less hassle.
You can hit a button and the machine will put the needle down. You hit another button and the machine starts sewing, you can adjust the speed using the slide on the body of the machine. The machine screams "Look Ma! No hands!" I was amused to find that the machines stitches looked a bit free hand. There was no chain where the stitches followed on one from the other in a perfect straight line. A few of the stitches went out of their neat row. For a new machine, it was disconcerting. Especially when the rep started talking about how the straight stitch is the most important stitch and these machines have beautiful straight stitches.
The machines will do button holes - themselves. Now this was neat. You put the button in the back of the foot, hit the button and the machine makes a button hole specially to fit the button. No more spending ten minutes trying to locate a tape measure so you can measure the button, add the extra 1/8 of an inch, make a test button hole, try and fit the button, discover that it doesn't fit so you make a slightly larger button hole. Now the button hole is too big and on you go. Except the goal of a button hole is to have a very close satin stitch - if my machine had produced these button holes, I would have ripped them out and investigated the machine to see what had gone wrong.
I did like the knee lever for lifting the pressure foot. For those times when you need to re-adjust the foot but don't want to move your hands as you're trying to prevent the fabric from skidding off in all directions. Now that I could use.
I'm not sure I have a use for 140 different stitches. I don't use the 16 I already have. I did like the 11 different button hold options. I just didn't like the way they were done.
The machine had a 25 year warranty. The electronics were only guaranteed for 5 years. The electronics get me. I know that machines eat fabric, while simultaneously wrapping the thread around bits of the machine that you didn't know exist and it is only with brute force, several choice words, and scissors that you will slowly extricate the fabric. With any luck it will be in one piece. Maybe the new machines are not like that. But I'm suspicious. I can't get at the electronics to force it to give me my fabric back. Sewing is a tactile hobby and for me that goes for the machine as well as the piece.
I came out with several goals. One to do more research to see what other brands were up to. And two to get one of my other machines up and running. I determined on my Singer. It just needed to be dusted off, oiled and a quick adjustment to the belt. I was thrilled to find that the stitches were absolutely beautiful. They were tight and ran in a straight unbroken line. They looked sturdy.
The Singer is a brute force of a machine and as mechanical as you can get. It's so simple not much can go wrong. You just have to think a bit more about using. And it was so many cool attachments I can't wait to figure out how to use them.
Apparently though, sewing machines have advanced since I bought mine. I've had mine a few years now. Yesterday, I went and investigated some new machines.
I learned that electronics are big. No longer do they use turn dials where you can hear the machine clicking into place - it's quietly done by the electronic dial or buttons. Some machines come with a needle threader. It will automatically thread your needle for you. I can thread my machine's needle faster and with less hassle.
You can hit a button and the machine will put the needle down. You hit another button and the machine starts sewing, you can adjust the speed using the slide on the body of the machine. The machine screams "Look Ma! No hands!" I was amused to find that the machines stitches looked a bit free hand. There was no chain where the stitches followed on one from the other in a perfect straight line. A few of the stitches went out of their neat row. For a new machine, it was disconcerting. Especially when the rep started talking about how the straight stitch is the most important stitch and these machines have beautiful straight stitches.
The machines will do button holes - themselves. Now this was neat. You put the button in the back of the foot, hit the button and the machine makes a button hole specially to fit the button. No more spending ten minutes trying to locate a tape measure so you can measure the button, add the extra 1/8 of an inch, make a test button hole, try and fit the button, discover that it doesn't fit so you make a slightly larger button hole. Now the button hole is too big and on you go. Except the goal of a button hole is to have a very close satin stitch - if my machine had produced these button holes, I would have ripped them out and investigated the machine to see what had gone wrong.
I did like the knee lever for lifting the pressure foot. For those times when you need to re-adjust the foot but don't want to move your hands as you're trying to prevent the fabric from skidding off in all directions. Now that I could use.
I'm not sure I have a use for 140 different stitches. I don't use the 16 I already have. I did like the 11 different button hold options. I just didn't like the way they were done.
The machine had a 25 year warranty. The electronics were only guaranteed for 5 years. The electronics get me. I know that machines eat fabric, while simultaneously wrapping the thread around bits of the machine that you didn't know exist and it is only with brute force, several choice words, and scissors that you will slowly extricate the fabric. With any luck it will be in one piece. Maybe the new machines are not like that. But I'm suspicious. I can't get at the electronics to force it to give me my fabric back. Sewing is a tactile hobby and for me that goes for the machine as well as the piece.
I came out with several goals. One to do more research to see what other brands were up to. And two to get one of my other machines up and running. I determined on my Singer. It just needed to be dusted off, oiled and a quick adjustment to the belt. I was thrilled to find that the stitches were absolutely beautiful. They were tight and ran in a straight unbroken line. They looked sturdy.
The Singer is a brute force of a machine and as mechanical as you can get. It's so simple not much can go wrong. You just have to think a bit more about using. And it was so many cool attachments I can't wait to figure out how to use them.