Sewing Machine Review, for Kids

Back in 2015, my daughter was 5 and had really taken and interest to sewing.  I had found a found a used, small craft sewing machine at the thrift store for $2.  After a couple months of trying to put the bobbin back on the little thing, I was ready to be done!!!  However, she couldn't use my machine because I was always using mine.  So, I did some research on sewing machines to purchase a machine for her for Christmas.  At 5, I think the main thing I was concerned about were the speed and having a foot guard.  I end up buying this cute Janome machine.  Janome 001Graceful Portable Sewing Machine.

Here are my pro's and con's:

Pro's:

1. It is super light weight, 5 lbs.  It is easy to transport and store.
2. It has a foot guard.  I love that I am not concerned that my child is going to get her fingers caught in the needle.
3.  It has all the basic necessary stitches.  Here are the specs right off amazon's website.

4 Stitches with 6 stitch width and length variations:

• 5 Straight Stitch variations (A – E) - Basic sewing, inserting zipper
• 3 Zig-Zag Stitch variations (F, G, H) - Basic mending, garment construction
• 1 Crescent / Scallop Stitch (I) - For embellishment and applique
• 1 Multi-Stitch ZigZag Stitch (J) - Stretch fabrics like knits

4.  It is the perfect sewing speed for a young child.  It is a medium-ish speed..doesn't go faster.
5.  Threads the same as my Bernina sewing machine, so my daughter is learning exactly how to thread that when I give her permission to sew with my machine.  There are easy to follow arrows on the machine itself.
6.  It fits my bobbins from my normal machine.  Probably not a big deal to anyone else, but if I have a bobbin of one color already somewhere in the house, I don't really want to create a second one.  Laziness and hopefully thriftiness.
7.  If you are into having a fun color....there are a million of options of color.  I bought this machine on Amazon and got an amazing deal on it that Christmas.  Always make sure to check current, past and lowest prices on camelcamelcamel.com for all Amazon products so you can see the overall trends through time.
8.  With the small complaints that I have below, I honestly think that this machine is going to last a really really long time and get a lot of good use.  The manual is easy to understand and follow.  When my daughter forgets how to do something when threading the machine, she pulls it out.

Con's:
1.  #4 above--not a good machine for an adult looking for a take along small machine on a quick get-a-away.  You will want to pull your hair out at the slowness of the speed.  It can't be adjusted.
2.  There is NO light.  When I bought this, I thought, that won't be a problem.  We will always be sewing in a well lit room.  But it absolutely sucks.  You can't see the needle to thread it without picking the machine up and putting it in the light or shining a flashlight on it.  Also, it turns my daughter off from sewing.  She will think she is sewing straight but can't see it really well and then gets frustrated when she has to unpick it.  (However, I found a solution to this problem that I have posted down below)
3.  The bobbin holder, while easy to open, a little hard for my daughter to thread and pull out in the right place.  It has to loop around twice and she usually forgets the second one.
4.  The thread holder in the top back of the machine has fallen off the machine twice.  Not only that, over time it slowly falls backwards so the spool of thread almost won't stay on.  When I see this I can pull it off the machine and pop it back in, but I think that if my daughter were to do it, she might break the part.  I might just have a faulty one, but it is annoying.
5.  There is no on-off switch.  So, if you don't want it to accidentally push the foot, you need to unplug it from the wall.
6.  The foot pedal: tiny.  I think I should maybe put that as a pro for a little child, but even my daughter finds that it is so small and light weight that it really moves around and she has a hard time pushing it down.  But, I would also expect with a lighter weight machine to have lighter weight parts.  I just wish this one had a bit more weight or substance.


Here she is threading her machine.  She is 7 1/2 in this picture and it comes easily now, just takes time like I would expect it to take for a younger child.

Her jealous brother watching her use her machine. He just needs a power tool...but what to give him, I have no idea.  He is just toooooo young!!

You can see in the picture above that she is really bending over to see what she is doing.  You can also see just how dark it is in there.  I got on Amazon to look for some kind of light to attach to her machine.  I found the following.  It is amazing!!!  Look at the light that it produces.  Yes, I used the sticky attachments and permanently attached it to her machine.  Obviously, I am not going to be taking it off since it was meant for the machine and also we can't handle the machine without the light.  I am sooooo excited.  (I purchased this light Jan 2018.)

(Before attaching)

What the light looks like close up

Madalynn checking out how I was attaching it

The bright LED's

From the front.

LED lights are bright, and these pictures make them look even brighter, but they are not as florescent as they appear.  Now that the light problems is handled, it really is such a good machine for her.  I am glad that I purchased it and I am grateful I found a fairly cheap solution to my major problem with it...even if it took me 2 years to do it.

Hope you enjoyed!!

Madalynn's first quilt....when she was 5!!

Back when my daughter was finally old enough that I felt like I could leave her with my machine for a few minutes and she wouldn't kill herself, I pulled out a rag quilt I had cut up many years beforet never finished.  It was the perfect combination of pink and purple fabrics.  It was also the perfect beginning quilt.  The lines don't have to be straight to make the x's across the center of each block and it doesn't totally matter if all the blocks are lined up straight.

I was thinking about this quilt when I was sewing earlier this week.  I had given my daughter a bunch of fabric that I have that I won't use and she was sitting on the table sewing.  The next morning while she was at school and not next to me, I really felt lonely while I was maching quilting a UFO quilt from 2008 and looking at her doodle/sketch book and her unfinished project.

But, it got me to get out the picture of her first quilt and it made me so happy that I have spent quality time helping her sew.  She not only finished cutting the batting for the rag quilt, but she sewed each square together, laid them out in the pattern you see in the quilt and then I helped her bring the rows one by one into the kitchen and keep them in order while she sewed them together.  But, except sitting and watching each square as she sewed to monitor...since she was still only 5 nearly 6, I did nothing else.  Man, I love this girl.  I can't wait to see what she creates over the years.  She is quite the artist in her own right.

The final quilt.  I put it out each year now on the back of my couch and it is so perfect.  I love her and I love the quilt.  

Her 3rd old brother trying to help. man, they were so small!!!!

Hope you enjoyed!!!

Fall 2017 Springville Art Museum Quilt show

Every year the Springville, Utah Art Museum has a quilt show.  I try and go every year because they are just so much fun.  For a long time in our house, we did Friday Museum days.  We are surrounded by hundreds of free, family friendly museums.  It is so fun.  I would take my kids to a variety of art shows, cultural museums, children's museums, history museums, old villages and buildings, forts, etc.  We loved it.  I couldn't keep up after my daughter Kindergarten year because I had to work a friday afternoon class the past year.  However, we do make special trips to see the things I am most interested in.  This years quilt show had a whole floor of red and white quilts on the children's exhibit floor.  They had the opportunity to create quilt blocks with shapes on paper.  It was so much fun!!  I got to walk around taking pictures and enjoyed the quilts while they had a great activity to do. 

They finished right as I finished looking at and admiring the 30 plus quilts.  It was a super fun day.

Then we headed up stairs to the 10 or so galleries that were full of quilts upstairs and the kids each picked their favorite quilt to take a picture with.

It is so inspiring seeing the artistry of these various quilters.  I hope that I can enjoy many more years of creating and being inspired by others.

Hope you enjoyed. 

Buying patterns and kids sewing machine

I don't enjoy making clothes.  There is something about reading the patterns, adding all the little details like zippers and hooks and such that I just don't like at all.  However, I think that it is important to teach a young sewer how to look for them and find them.  If my daughter ends up enjoying sewing, she should know what her options are when she comes to a point where she wants to create.  3 years ago I snapped this shot..

Gah, she was so young.  She didn't even have glasses yet.  She has had glasses for as long as I can remember now. 

For Christmas I purchased an apron pattern and fabric to make it and wrapped it up in a box for her.  She wanted to sew last Sat, so I pulled it out and set her loose.  She got the pattern cut out before we needed to get some other stuff done.  I purchased that little purple Janome sewing machine on Amazon for her 6th birthday 2 years ago.  Giving a child a machine: has it's pro's and con's.  It is nice that she can sew herself.  It is frustrating trying to teach her how to put the bobbin in and thread the machine esp. since trying to pull the thread through the needle with the safety guard on the foot is SO frustrating.  I also need to get her a little light to attach to the machine so she can see better.  Otherwise, I have enjoyed that she has the freedom to create and try and discover things.  While the machine goes a constant fast speed which is a medium speed on my own machine, I like the little machine and how light weight it is.  It is nice to have something little to grab when I need a machine to go to a quick church sewing activity when I don't want to carry my bigger machine around.  I just have to be more patient when sewing because it takes more time. 

Hopefully, I find time to sit down and work with her on the apron this coming Sat so she can feel the accomplishment of finishing something fun.

Hope you enjoyed. 

The Kid's Sewing

Over the past couple years, I have been working on teaching my kids to sew.  I purchased a small sewing machine for my daughter for her 6th birthday.  She is still learning how to use it as a basic machine, but she has had some fun with it over time. The following pictures are just a hodge podge of the pillow covers and the pajama pants they have made in the past year.

Sometime I hope to get a good video of my son using my sewing machine.  When I am teaching my kids to sew I let them run the foot pedal while I push the fabric through the machine.  My now 5 year old son, thinks that running the sewing machine is the best thing that has ever happened to him.  He seriously laughs so hard.

Hope you enjoy.