Welcome. Glad to see a guy with interest. You can get a machine with an embroidery unit that attaches. There are different size fields that they will sew. They start at 4"x4" & go up. I am partial to the Brother ULTs. They came in 2001,2002 & 2003 so you may find a good used one since they now have the Innovis4000 & the PR600 that people have upgraded to. They have 4 hoop sizes & you can purchase adjustable hoops that will accomodate larger designs. Your sewing field won't change, you just slide the hooped project to accomodate the next design segment. If you understand hooping, you have trouble rehooping & lining things up to add additional designs. The "Hoop it Alls" work great there. You can get a hoop to do baseball caps too. The ULTs came on the market with a MSLP of about $6000. Internet prices were around $3200-$3500 new. Use those figures in reference to used prices. I would not buy any software until I knew I needed it. Mine was PE design 4.0 with a MSLP of $1500 & I paid $899. Money blown big time! You can get tons of designs free from internet sites. Unless you are an artist & want to make your own designs, I really see little use for the software. I was thinking copying things & did not know at the time of purchase that copying logos & etc would be an infringment of copy right laws.

As far as sewing, some colleges offer sewing classes in their noncredit programs. Most decor things are just your personal measurements & straight line sewing. There is a book I bought for my students called "Sewing for Dummies". It is good. Decor magazines have good ideas too. Just learn to sew & enjoy it. I have a great niece who started first grade this year. She made PJs Christmas of 03 for presents & has gone from there. If you really want to sew, you can!

If you want to sew home decor, I'd recommend a used, all metal, mechanical heavy duty machine. A Pfaff or Bernina is best, tho I know someone that loves her Janome. Or a used industrial Pfaff or Juki. I don't know anything about embroidery machines, but I would get a separate machine that does embroidery. I sew soft furnishings for the home and I have an old 1222 Pfaff with the duel feed (a walking foot) (home model) and a Pfaff industrial. I live in PA, too.

Well, I should probably just stick to sewing for now and add embroidery to my "sometime in the future" list.

Shadylady2u - Walking foot? Dual feed? You speak with forked tongue!... I guess I should get that sewing for dummy's book.

Thanks.

Hi, Bud - welcome to the (confusing!) world of sewing machines! At the risk of being too basic, the fabric feeds through the sewing machine by way of feed dogs on the bottom that move up & down and front to back. The fabric is kept in contact with the feed dogs via a presser foot. You will soon find out (!) that there are a wide variety of specialized presser feet for sewing all kinds of things. A walking foot is one of those specialized feet - it uses the same motion as the feed dogs to make sure that the top layer of fabric is feeding at the same speed as the bottom layer. With regular presser feet, the layers can shift a bit on you. That shift isn't usually a problem, but if you are sewing something thick like a couple layers of upholstery fabric or a quilt, or something that needs to match precisely like stripes or plaid, the walking foot gives some extra traction to keep those layers together.

I have a Brother PC8500, which is a step down from the ULT mentioned before. It does fabulous sewing, you can get a walking foot, and it does great embroidery! I have made a number of home dec things for my house with it, and lots of quilts, and have embroidered lots of gifts.

You mentioned Janome & Bernina - those are both excellent brands, and offer a wide variety of machines. Your best bet at this point would probably be to sit down with the dealer and see what they have to offer.

Donna

Go to the sewing machine store, and spend an hour or two. Have the sales person go through the machine and show you how it all works. You'll know feed dogs, tension, etc. in no time.

Since you mentioned that you want a sturdy good quality machine, you'll want a brand that is made in Europe. Janome, Bernina, Pfaff, or Viking are all good quality well-made machines with their fan clubs. (Good engineering, metal parts, solid construction.) Expect to pay for a good sewing machine what you would for a pretty good computer.

You don't necessarily need an industrial machine but check and see what the dealer says about comparisons. You would go to a different dealer for the industrial machines. Much like a car, you can test-drive sewing machines. Bring some material samples to see how the stitches go and how it "feels". Like cars, sometimes a couple are just really similar, so what it comes down to is feel and where the buttons are and does it seem easier to operate this one or that one.

Ask the dealer about the embroidery features. You can buy a system that will enable you to: scan or otherwise create a design, "digitize" it so that the machine understands how to sew it, and save it in a way that your machine will understand, and interface your machine with your computer. You will need to learn about how all this software works. If you have messed with images and photoshop or some other photo manipulation program, you won't have any trouble with figuring out the software.

There's a bit of trial and error on the actual stitching. Fabrics vary in thickness and need to have a stiffener so that they won't scrunch all up when you stitch that much thread into a design on them. If you do a really big design, say on a 16" by 16" pillow top, you'll need to learn all that hooping stuff that Joan was talking about. That is because the machine can only sew on a relatively small area.

Though there is a bit of a learning curve, really phenomenal things can be done with the machine embroidery.

For home sewing, check your library for home dec how-tos. That'll get you started on the pillows/curtains etc.

Here is a link that might be useful: Embroidery Arts link

"You speak with forked tongue!... " LOL!! Funny!!
Actually, when I was referring to a Walking Foot, I meant a Walking Foot Machine, not a presser foot. Most machines have a "drop feed", which means the feed dog goes up and down and moves the fabric along. Then there's "needle feed", which means the needle helps push the fabric along, and then there's "compound feed" which means the feed dog and the needle move the fabric. This is what the Pfaff with dual feed does and also the industrial walking foot machines. This keeps the layers of fabric moving along together.
Here's a site with detailed info if you're interested. Click on "Feed Systems". Some of this info applies to home machines, also.

Here is a link that might be useful: IndustrialSewingMachine

Thank you all for you inputs. I am learning a lot. I went to the dealer and was somewhat surprised at what you could spend.... especially the Janone 11000! Ouch!!

Anyway, she showed me quite a few new machines but she also has 2 - Janome Memory Craft 9000's that she took in on trade. She told me that she was selling them for $1000 but she is dropping the price to $500 each. This seems like a great deal as she will service it before she sells it. What do you all think? I assume it's a good machine but do they have any history of problems?

Thanks!!!

If she is willing to sell them for $500, I would definitely take a test drive. That is a great price for that machine. Take a look before you decide!

That's one opinion... any others? I have the 9000 brochure to look at but I'd like some first hand opinions.

Thanks!

As long as she is willing to back it, I would jump on that machine for $500. Definitely give it a test drive first, though.

There are just too many machines out there that are excellent and if you think you are really into sewing and want to upgrade to a better machine, you can certainly sell your $500 machine or trade it in for a different model. So many of us start out that way! Good luck!

I'd rather get a better machine now than a beginner machine.

I think you're smart to try to get a machine w/ at least some bells and whistles.

Bcs often I have found that the opportunity to "play" with a special stitch, etc., was the thing that motivated me to actually make a project. I once made a shirt just to try out the double-needle capability. It was a nice shirt!

Any machine you buy will let you make curtains and pillows. That's simple straight-line stitching; you might ccasionally need some power, if you're using denim and have more than 2 layers. But most machines can do that. (this is a great reason to learn how to sew, btw. I live in NYC, where no window is a standard size; custom curtains are really expensive, but cheap if you make them yourself)

That $500 reconditioned sounds like a pretty good deal.

But if it falls through, be sure to get a machine with:

stretch stitch capability
double-needle capability
built-in buttonhole capability (used to be rare; now common on all but the cheapest)

My vote: no less than 12 stitches, 24 would be good, more would be better.