My regular seams are fine, I only seem to struggle when it hits another seam, then it REALLY yanks it to the left. If I go super slow and really go easy it works, but I can't waste that much time when I'm sewing 90" long seams and have to pass over 20++ cross seams! It'll take me forever to do that! But when I'm just starting and doing just a simple 4-8" seam I find it easier to get a real good 1/4" seam compared to the 5mm (but that might be slightly more due to markings on the machine and foot).
For the decorative stuff I just play around with it. I don't use it often. On my old machine I only used it to make blacklight costumes for my husband's band, and for a dress for me to wear to the shows. Otherwise I'd mess around for fun, nothing serious. I mainly bought this machine for the harp space, the hopefully better control over things and for something that will take me through the rest of my sewing life. But now I'm not sure. I don't use bells and whistles for anything in my life (don't own cell phone etc) which is why I bought this machine over a more expensive one (since I did have a bit of the money saved I spent the extra $500 or so on fabric!) but I wanted the bigger space and thought the 9mm would be a good thing.