New Toy........

I'm still here, spent the weekend on the coast reading, knitting and working in the yard. I'm not spending time taking photos for my etsy shop so I can list new items, not weaving much, sewing I want to get done in the next few weeks is pushed aside........trying to not beat myself up over it........not to mention pulling weeds and grass out of the flower beds here. And to add to the mix a new toy arrived yesterday - my new inexpensive (downright cheap) Brother SE-400 embroidery machine - only $368 from Amazon. This is something I never thought I'd buy but I caught the bug. My plans are to embellish everything in sight......well, not really but I will be putting it to work. I can picture using very simple designs to embellish clothing, art quilts, etc. I've already seen a ton of them I'm adding to my wish list at Embroidery Library. This place has very affordable designs. There are lots of ginkgos and dragonflies, my favorites not to mention spinning wheels and other fun designs. Hubby Sam and my cousin Jim are already eyeing the golf designs for their golf shirts and such.

I first pulled the manual out of the box to read it over, lots of info on the sewing part of the machine - lacking in general info on the embroidery module. I then watched part of the dvd that came with it, still very little info so I decided to jump in. The machine comes with many designs, most of which I'd never use, but great for learning on.

The first one I tried was a one color teatime design - I like it
Then on to a cross-stitch looking rose, I wanted to see how changing colors worked

Then I needed to learn how to download a design off the internet, hook the laptop up to the machine and stitch - this is where instructions were really lacking but it was easy! Had a little issue with figuring out colors but that's ok, it was a learning experience. Not sure what I'll do with this basket of flowers, maybe sew it into a little pouch, it was a quick free download to learn on.

Next step is playing with the alphabets and how to line them up under a motif. I bought a fun 40 rayon thread pack, also through Amazon, to start with, need to look at my colors and see what I need to fill in. I have  a number of different stablizers to try out, much to learn about those, which is right for what project. So many to choose from - different weights, tear away, wash away, knit like, sticky, iron on. I could see from downloading only 2 free designs yesterday that I needed to figure out a good pattern management plan on the laptop before downloading more. Programs can be bought for this but I didn't want to spend another $100 so I set up files, put the design file in it, copied a picture of the finished embroidery off the website and put that in it along with a list of the color numbers for thread - great solution and it was free. What a time sucker this all was yesterday but it was fun! Today I'm off to my spinning group, then to meet a couple friends for tea & dessert to celebrate a birthday so nothing will get done in the studio at all today. Tomorrow am  hoping to buy more flowers to plant in the deck planters and then get to the studio to think about sewing some clothes from some of that fabric I bought at the Sewing Expo. Eventually I need to get back to the loom.....oh and dyeing roving will be coming soon too.........