Neesie,
I owned an embroidery machine before that had the 4x4. For me it was a great learning tool however think of this too...on the 5 x 7 you can do a small amount of embroidery patterns on the same hoop such as quilt labels and applique embroidery. Just a thought. I mostly use my 5x7 or my 6x6. I use the 60 wt. bobbin thread and for FSL I use the same color in the bobbin. Like Quilty Louise I too am a deep Floriani thread fan and at first I used Sulky since they always had great sales on them at Joann's, 50%! Everything will be a "trial by fire" and once you get the hang of it there is not stopping you LOL!

http://www.quiltingboard.com/images/misc/quote_icon.png Originally Posted by VivianW http://www.quiltingboard.com/images/...post-right.png
I have a Viking designer SE Purchased new when they came out many years ago. Has less than 5 hours on it! I'm afraid of it and never learned to use it. Have never loaded the things I purchased on it. Have the 3D professional, endless embroidery hoop, quilters kit III, mega hoop, never opened any of the boxes. I think they are up to like the 5th version now???? Would this be for someone like me that has an EM but doesn't know anything?





Hi VivianW: You have a fine machine! Did it come with a manual, if so, dig it out and start at the beginning and just follow each sentence and picture. It's real easy to do. I have a Designer I and a Ruby Deluxe. They are very user friendly. See if there is a dealer in your area or not to far away and go see them to see what classes they can offer to help you learn to use your machine. It's to good of a machine not to use it and they embroider and sew beautifully....
I love both of mine...
Good luck...

Also I have the metal hoop for the Husqvarna Viking Ruby Deluxe and it works like a charm!!

I just bought the brother pe770 and have just played around some. Yesterday I was embroidering on a pot holder and used, used dryer sheet for my stablizer and it worked great. Cut it away. Just had to try it.

Good morning all. I had a great weekend last week. I attended the Floriani event and my lqs in Naples and I learned quite a lot. We all got to work with the new Destiny machine in groups and did some exciting projects. I will say that the machine has a lot of features to include its IQ scanner. I have the Babylock Spirit and I'm not interested in forking over $10,000 for the Destiny. Like with any machine it will take time to learn its features and its temperament, i.e. threads. All of our projects were done in-the-hoop and though we came home with the designs we worked on they were only meant for the Ellisimo or the Destiny. I can minimize the design on my machine so I"ll give that a try. I also received a free cd from a friend of mine about threads and that was one is very interesting. The one thing I learned is when using metallic threads to put the spool in backwards. If you have a standing thread spool this works very well. All of our embroidering was done with the stand and never once did the thread break. The cost of the workshop vs. what I learned is worth it.

I have the PE770 too, and I bought a box of pre-wound bobbins on Amazon that have worked great. I bought these: http://www.amazon.com/ThreadsRus-Pre...rother+bobbins

They come out to about 21 cents per bobbin. I would have had to buy empty bobbins and wind them so for me this was a good deal. They're wound very full and my machine loves them.

So far, I've only used the #90 thread that came with my machine. Luckily, it uses the same bobbin as my Janome and other Brother. Winding the bobbins doesn't bother me. For my regular machines, I usually wind two or three at a time. Good to know the pre-wounds work well, though! I may break down and try them, in the future.

You will love pre wound bobbins when you start using them. You have to wind 2.5 to 3 reg. bobbins to 1 pre-wound bobbins. I also use them for my quilting, works great.

Agreed, JuanitaBean - I keep checking my prewound bobbins while embroidering because I can't believe they last as long as they do!

I've spent most of today on the computer, searching for a way to make a decent quilt label with a smaller font (less than 1/2"), without spending a fortune. Been reading all of the suggestions and tried out a couple free demos. Unfortunately, it seems most of the programs concentrate more on graphics and lettering is more of an afterthought. Now I'm looking at SewArt Digitizing Embroidery Software. The way I'm reading it, is it'll convert graphic file extensions into the embroidery software extensions. If that's the case, I'm thinking I can do my lettering in PhotoShop and then after saving, will be able to import it into the SewArt, for conversion into PES. Has anyone ever done this? If so, did it work?

I did find a couple of 1/4" fonts and bought one . . . but the stitching width isn't proportional to the size of the letter, so the overall effect is of a larger letter that's been compacted. I don't want printed labels, as they aren't practical for kids' quilts, which need to withstand many washings.

Any advice, before I pull out the rest of my hair? I've already resorted to chocolate, twice! :p