Happy Birthday to me!
Ok, so it was a few days ago, but I've spent the last three days playing with my presents. This year I got WAY more than I was expecting. Roland got me some really rockin' presents (he makes me so happy). When we got up he gave told me he had arranged his schedule so he could stay home with me all day. Then he gave me my first gift, a gift certificate for a manicure and pedicure. So nice. I went over and had my manicure and pedicure and since I was there and they weren't busy I also got my hair trimmed (for the first time in over a year - yikes). I came home feeling very refreshed and relaxed. Then we hung out together all day. He told me we were going out to dinner at 6:30, but wouldn't tell me where. So I asked him what he was wearing so I could judge what I should wear and got ready. We ended up at the Melting Pot, which was the perfect choice. We had a fabulous dinner and dessert (mmm melted chocolate - I used a spoon Jason, not a straw). Then we came home and I got to open presents. Roland also got me some books I really wanted and screen covers for my DS which I really needed. Mom and Dad C. got me HP and the Goblet of Fire on DVD and some candy (yeah baby). Anne and Karl got me some jewelry, a cool new DS game that we can interact wirelessly with, and other assorted fun stuff.
I mentioned in a previous post that my parents got me a computer, which came earlier this month, is totally awesome, and I use it every day. It has been extremely helpful in the creation of the AnneArchy website. Needless to say I thought that was all I was getting from my parents (I mean, really, that is more than one would expect anyway). Then my mom told me to be expecting another package from them as she had gotten me another small gift, so I would have something to open on my birthday. So I'm thinking, cool they got me a book, or some chocolates, or whatever. I was out when the UPS dude tried to deliver it on the 29th, so Roland was nice enough to stick around the apartment on the 30th so he could sign for it while I went out and got pampered. When I got home the package was huge...and heavy. It turned out to be an embroidery sewing machine. What? What! I have wanted one of these...well, as long as I've known that such an animal existed. But I never expected anyone to get me one.
It is incredibly cool. It has about a ton of built in stitches including two different one step button holes. Then it has the ability to connect to a computer via USB and using the program provided with the machine you can embroider with it. Most of the machines I've seen out there have that program built into the actual sewing machine. A person then inserts what amounts to a flash drive into the machine with the designs on it. However these machines often only accept a certain format of designs. The Futura software allows you to use a bunch of different formats. I think all the cool stuff it can do like that is because the whole computer is at your disposal instead of just the resources in the machine. This also means it is updatable. When I first opened it, I thought that I would install the software on the laptop and just bring that in the craft room/library when I needed it, but then I realized I have a better solution. I just got a new computer, remember? Now I have a perfectly good desktop just sitting around not doing anything. Sure it's not the fastest thing in the world, but it still works (thanks to a new hard drive). So I set that up in the craft room and after a few false starts (one thing the Singer people could do a little better with the documentation end of things) I have embroidered a couple of samples. I just used some left-over fabric I had sitting around. Anyone who has been to the house we used to have in Grand Rapids might recognize it as the fabric I used to make the roman shades in the master bedroom.
This is my first one. It turned out pretty well, but the white bobbin was pulling through to the top a little bit, so on the next one
I started playing with the top thread tension. As you can see the right side of the design was where I was really messing with it. The left side I put it back to where it is supposed to be. I still see it a little though, so I'm going to see if I can improve that as I go on. Then I downloaded a design on-line and embroidered it.
I like that one a lot, but clearly I need some help with the picture taking side of things. So far I've stuck with designs with only a few colors for two reasons. I don't have very many colors in embroidery thread, and I'm new at this so I'm keeping it simple. Anyway, this thing is super cool and I'm totally in craft-geek-topia.
An interesting experience though. I went to Joann yesterday to get some bobbin and embroidery thread to get started and as I was looking at the thread, a lady there turned to me and said "You know those are embroidery thread, right?" There was just something in her tone that made me think, she assumes that because I'm under the age of 50 I couldn't possibly know about or be involved in embroidery. Since I've been doing embroidery of one kind or another for over 20 years now, I felt a little offended by her remark. I tried to shrug it off, but it bothered me for most of rest of the day.
I mentioned in a previous post that my parents got me a computer, which came earlier this month, is totally awesome, and I use it every day. It has been extremely helpful in the creation of the AnneArchy website. Needless to say I thought that was all I was getting from my parents (I mean, really, that is more than one would expect anyway). Then my mom told me to be expecting another package from them as she had gotten me another small gift, so I would have something to open on my birthday. So I'm thinking, cool they got me a book, or some chocolates, or whatever. I was out when the UPS dude tried to deliver it on the 29th, so Roland was nice enough to stick around the apartment on the 30th so he could sign for it while I went out and got pampered. When I got home the package was huge...and heavy. It turned out to be an embroidery sewing machine. What? What! I have wanted one of these...well, as long as I've known that such an animal existed. But I never expected anyone to get me one.
It is incredibly cool. It has about a ton of built in stitches including two different one step button holes. Then it has the ability to connect to a computer via USB and using the program provided with the machine you can embroider with it. Most of the machines I've seen out there have that program built into the actual sewing machine. A person then inserts what amounts to a flash drive into the machine with the designs on it. However these machines often only accept a certain format of designs. The Futura software allows you to use a bunch of different formats. I think all the cool stuff it can do like that is because the whole computer is at your disposal instead of just the resources in the machine. This also means it is updatable. When I first opened it, I thought that I would install the software on the laptop and just bring that in the craft room/library when I needed it, but then I realized I have a better solution. I just got a new computer, remember? Now I have a perfectly good desktop just sitting around not doing anything. Sure it's not the fastest thing in the world, but it still works (thanks to a new hard drive). So I set that up in the craft room and after a few false starts (one thing the Singer people could do a little better with the documentation end of things) I have embroidered a couple of samples. I just used some left-over fabric I had sitting around. Anyone who has been to the house we used to have in Grand Rapids might recognize it as the fabric I used to make the roman shades in the master bedroom.
This is my first one. It turned out pretty well, but the white bobbin was pulling through to the top a little bit, so on the next one
I started playing with the top thread tension. As you can see the right side of the design was where I was really messing with it. The left side I put it back to where it is supposed to be. I still see it a little though, so I'm going to see if I can improve that as I go on. Then I downloaded a design on-line and embroidered it.
I like that one a lot, but clearly I need some help with the picture taking side of things. So far I've stuck with designs with only a few colors for two reasons. I don't have very many colors in embroidery thread, and I'm new at this so I'm keeping it simple. Anyway, this thing is super cool and I'm totally in craft-geek-topia.
An interesting experience though. I went to Joann yesterday to get some bobbin and embroidery thread to get started and as I was looking at the thread, a lady there turned to me and said "You know those are embroidery thread, right?" There was just something in her tone that made me think, she assumes that because I'm under the age of 50 I couldn't possibly know about or be involved in embroidery. Since I've been doing embroidery of one kind or another for over 20 years now, I felt a little offended by her remark. I tried to shrug it off, but it bothered me for most of rest of the day.
posted by Susan at 5:05 PM
4 Comments:
Congrats on getting that machine! I'm sure you're going to kick all kinds of embroidery ass with it! :)
Happy Birthday and congratulations on the embroidery machine... very cool. I'm jealous about the whole Melting Pot dinner, I guess there's nothing to do but come down and visit so that we can all go back there :)
I am thinking that I would like Susan's partents as my own. Let them know that my birthday is Nov. 30th.
Wow, that is a kick-ass birthday. And the embroidery thing- holy cow! What a nice surprise. That stupid lady at Joanne's is just jealous because she didn't get one til she was 68.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home