I'm such a gearhead sometimes.

Well, the machine is here! And oddly enough, it matches the decor of the room it's living in right now, ha ha. That wasn't done intentionally, especially since I plan to redo that room. I've been playing with it and having a good time practicing stitches and learning the quirks of my very own machine. It took me a while to get the hang of the automatic needle threader (not so automatic), but once I got the hang of it, it's gold. Also, for a non-jamming bobbin, I can tell you for a fact that it DOES jam. The other thing is that the feed dogs don't move on this machine, so I have to manually move the fabric myself much more, which I didn't have to do on the loaner machine. All things I've learned the hard way, you could say. Yes, I looked at the manual. After the fact, of course. :-P I did figure out how to use the one-step button hole maker. That was pretty cool, and yes, it DOES work. The other problem is not so much the machine as much as the table it's on. It's just a collapsible small table-- a folding table, if you will, and while it can support the machine just fine, when you get to sewing, (I almost said "knitting" there for a moment out of habit!) the motion of the machine causes some serious vibrations of the tabletop, hence the machine is bouncing up and down on the table, kind of. So, I supposed there is a learning curve involved here. But that's okay. I have a good foundation to build on.

In the meantime, I had some JoAnn's Fabrics coupons (I'll probably be saving those up now, like I do the Michaels and AC Moore coupons for yarn now and then), and decided to invest in a pretty rotary cutter and a cutting board. I also bought some more remnant cloth for practice or possibly making something. I received my fancier Fiskars Pinking shears that I won dirt cheap off eBay today in the mail. (It was worth about $31 and I got it for a third of that price including the shipping.) I'm no thinking that I need to get a magnetic seam guide and a tracing wheel as well. So I have LOTS of gear at this point for a beginner sewer, don't you think?

Here's the thing, though. Other than that pincushion, I haven't made a damn thing. Not one item. I've played with stitches and such, but I haven't made something from a pattern of any kind and produced an actual finished product. How pathetic is that? Pretty pathetic, if you ask me. I think that I need to get on the ball. Part of me is very anxious and excited to do that, and part of me is scared out of my mind to make it. I mean, what's the worst that could happen? The worst is that it would come out badly, and yet I know that comes with the territory of learning. But I want to be super successful with my first project-- is that so wrong? I already decided that I'm going to make a practice tote bag with "scrap" fabric that I have first, then make the nice one for my friend. Oddly enough, I'm scared to make the practice one. Bleeh! I need to get on the ball, and stop buying gear and MAKE SOMETHING!