This is what happened yesterday.
Disaster! My little Bernette sewing machine started playing up and skipping stitches whilst I was in the middle of appliquéing an eye on a new tweetie bird.
This was the result:
She’s quite elderly, my Bernette. My mum and dad bought her for me in 1989. I still have the original receipt. The shop she came from doesn’t exist any more.
My parents are gone too. But Bernette is still with me.
She is a basic range Bernina machine, metal-bodied and therefore very heavy. She’s lost a bit of her finesse over the years and tends to work at either hurricane speed or nothing, but I am used to her ways and only get cross with her occasionally.
I didn’t get cross with her yesterday though. Because I live in dread of her expiring.
Luckily, I now have another machine.
This is the new kid on the block…
It’s a Singer Inspiration 4220. I inherited it from my partner’s dad.
I knew, in my heart of hearts, that one day the need for a back-up machine would come. Yesterday was the day.
The new machine is plastic. Lightweight. Some would say curvy, though the word that springs to my mind is bulbous.
I managed to find a manual online and got it threaded up. (I’m afraid I just can’t think of it as a “she”.)
And it sews! Very slowly, by comparison with Bernette. And with less settings – so less flexibility and adjustability.
But to be honest, I am more than grateful. Intricate eye appliqué calls for a bit more finesse than Bernette seemed capable of in her grumpy – but speedy – old age. I had been doing more and more of my appliqué using just the hand wheel.
The Singer actually did a really good job…
A guilty thought struck me… what if I start to like the Singer better than Bernette? Perhaps she’ll be offended and play up all the more? I felt disloyal.
But then I gave myself a slap and remembered that despite my tendency towards imbuing every inanimate object with a personality (usually, I have to say, an evil and conniving one), they are just lumps of metal.
Or plastic, in the Singer’s case.
They don’t have feelings.
Anyway, I haven’t given up on Bernette.
She is going into hospital – I mean, for a service this morning. ♥
Ahh, but they do have feelings. Some of them anyway. 🙂 Maybe you’ll find you enjoy using both for different things…the best of both worlds and all. Can’t wait to see your finished bird!
Don’t encourage me erica! I already have an evil washing machine and a recalcitrant laptop! I am trying to be a grown-up and wean myself off personification of inanimate objects! 😉
Consider yourself encouraged. ;D I personally refuse to grow up (too bad my body won’t follow)
I have gone through many machines in my time and 2 years ago spent more on a new Juki than I have ever spent on 1 item….it felt like I was buying a new car! It does amazing things and has made my sewing life so much easier….however my hearts still belongs to my old Singer Treadle machine given to me by my Aunt who taught me to sew when I was about 12. The machine now sits proudly in my garden and I often smile in her direction. I too have her receipt,dated 1955…..the year I was born!
Ahh, what is it about sewing machines that inspires such love? I don’t feel like that about my toaster, or my iron.
(Although I do have a guilty crush on my Russell Hobbs kettle. Especially now that they don’t make them any more, so it is the last of its noble line).
I am always amazed how long these sewing machines last. I think they must last longer than any other appliance and seemingly infinitely fixable by a good sewing machine mechanic.
The man who serviced my machine last time said the same. He said some customers got annoyed with him when he had to tell them their over-30-years-old machines had expired and pointed out that they wouldn’t expect their vacuum cleaner or washing machine to last half as long!
…..forgot to say I was still using the Treadle in the early 90s….making curtains for a living while my kids were still too young for me to do much else. I often say the Treadle bought them up….much more reliable than the father that’s for sure!!!
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