Originally Posted by Scraplady

I've been shopping for a new SM for some time. I thought I had done all my
homework and had just about settled on one. Then I stopped by an unknown (to me) dealer and discovered the Brother Innov-is VQ3000 "Dreamweaver". (This is the "twin sister" of the Baby Lock Crescendo over which I had done rather a lot of oohing and ahing, but decided was just too rich for my blood. I'm also in the market for my first EM and had a set amount to spend on both.) After a number of demos and testing and some further unnecessary drooling, just for fun, I asked for a price. Her quote was far less than the Baby Lock, and Brother is running a promotion thru Jan. 28th. That night I told my investor (DH) all about my adventure.

Long story short, we went back yesterday, and I came home with not only the Dreamweaver, but a Brother PE-780D EM as well! I think I chose well--DH, that is. He has always been my greatest supporter and far more willing to spend big bucks on my equipment than I am. He said I deserve a machine worthy of my talent! What a man! And hopefully the machines will be a good choice as well.

I have never owned a TOL machine, so I'm looking forward to discovering all it can do. So far it is out of the box--no easy task, this is a behemoth of a machine with an 11.25" harp. The clock is set (still wondering about this since I mostly prefer NOT to watch the clock when I'm sewing...must be a way to disable that feature), a bobbin is wound and the needle is threaded. Now, how long do we sit here and stare at it and wonder where to start?!