Recommended sewing machine of your choice?
 

Looking to up grade my sewing machine I have a Janome and looking to get a better one. Can you tell me what you have and what I should look for. Quilt festival is coming to Houston in a couple of weeks and I want to try them out but what to see what you all think.

Sewing machine preference is pretty subjective. Personally, I'm a Bernina girl. I love my Berninas. That said, many people don't care for them at all. You will probably have to just try a lot of machines out and see which one you like the best. One thing I will say is that IMO Quilt Festival isn't the best place to be trying out a machine. There is a lot of confusion and hustle which, for me, would make it hard to concentrate and decide. I prefer to go to a store where I can quietly try out the machines that I'm interested in.

Whatever you do, decide before hand which features you really want, which don't matter and which ones you just have to have. It will help you narrow down the choices and not get upsold a lot of machine that you don't really want/need.

I love my Janome Magnolia 7330 and I have a Janome 6600 that I also love. You didn't say what Janome you have so I don't know if my are the same as what you have or not

Love my straight stitch only Juki TL98QE and Babylock Jane.

I have a brother dream machine and I love it. My biggest issue with it is size. I didn’t think ahead to needing to take it to classes, it’s a monster to haul around.

Bernina is my very favorite machine.

I love all my Brothers from the dinky mechanical ones up to my PQ 1500. I also have a bunch of nice vintage machines

New Machines
 

I have some Janomes and some Pfaff. I have Pfaff creative 4 sewing and embroidery machine. I am not really in love with it. But I like some of the features. I have an older Janome Craft 6000 that is about 30 to 40 years old and it is a real workhorse but doesn’t have all the new features. I would love a new Janome. Maybe one day. Depending on your budget a moderate price is the Brother machines and I have heard a lot of good things about it.

So subjective isn't it? Juki for me.

What Janome model do you currently have? I purchased a 6600 in 2011 after working on an old Pfaff then I upgraded to an 8900 about 3 years ago but still love my 6600...it is a work horse. I have since purchased a Bernina 770 QE that is now my “go to” machine.

I also think it also depends on your budget. Good luck.