Ann thanks for the link. That's a colossal work, she's done. I find it sad that The Royal Society sells prints, which have been altered from the original. Even the bachelor's buttons have been altered. Seil unless you have cool summers and a nice shady/ moist spot, it is very difficult to grow Meconopsis. I've had a lot of success with Flanders & Turkish poppies (Papaver rhoeas & glaucum). You just direct sow them at the end of winter.

Are you sure that card is compatible with that machine? Is the card made by the viking co? I also have a viking Rose,but i'm not familiar with that card.Do you have a viking dealer close by that you could call?? Kathi

I wonder if what she was using was the bullion stitch. It makes a sort of elongated French knot that is often used as you describe. There is a popular embroidery technique right now called "Brazilian" which is basically just crewel embroidery done with rayon threads. If you google "Brazilian Embroidery" there are a lot of sites with information. Or see if you can get a book on the subject through your local library. Annie

I have a Janome 350E which I use almost daily mainly to make cat toys for local animal rescues. I have a really long list of my favourite embroidery web sites but my recommendation of one of the best and very active helpful sites would be www.sewforum.com. There are two boards here that you should look at. One has patterns (free) that many digitizers generously put up and the other is a help board for those of us have difficulty with. One of the most common frustrations that a beginner has is not making sure the presser foot is in the up position when threading. Sometimes you get "nesting" issues (collection of thread) that require you to clean out the bobbin area and re-thread. (I ended up taking my machine back to have it "repaired" before the shop owner showed me shaking his head laughing!) I don't know how many times I've given this advice to on the sew forum. One of my favourite computer programs to go along with my machine is SewIconz which displays the icon on my computer embroidery folder so that it just isn't a name - a picture which tells me the size of the image and type of file. Janome uses .JEF files. PES are the most common but there are a number of programs (some free) that allow you to convert PES to JEF for the Janome. I've also learned to sit by my machine while stitching. Tempting to multi-task but I follow Murphy's Law - Walk away and something will happen! Hope you have as much fun as I have had with mine. If I can help - leave a message and I'll e-mail you.