About a month ago, I decided that it was time - way past time, in fact - to finish a quilt that had been languishing in my quilt frame for about 2 years. The problem was that my machine had been acting crazy - skipping stitches, making bird nests under the bottom, breaking the thread every few inches, and just generally acting a fool. I threatened to sell it, and even took pictures to post on the local sell/swap site; whilst I deliberated, I took the partially-completed quilt off the frame and took it to a quilt shop where I rented a quilting machine to finish it. Had to spend $20 for a lesson on how to use the danged thing, then $50 for a day's rental.
This rented machine was a doozie. I put the quilt in the frame, threaded the machine, and sat down in a rolling chair to begin the work. There was a thick rubber mat in front of the machine - 3 feet wide and as long as the quilt frame - and my chair would not roll on it. I pushed sideways with my feet several times but the chair would not budge. The shop lady helped me move the mat, and I went back to work.
The next morning, my right knee was swollen and tight, seemingly for no reason. It hurt to put weight on it, and I limped around all weekend. Monday, at work, when I needed to push sideways at my desk, my knee exploded with pain, and I realized what had caused the injury: pushing too hard, sideways, on the mat at the quilt store. Since my work often involves climbing stairs, the knee gave me a few rough days, but it gradually got better.
At the rented quilting machine, I learned that the thread breakage part of my machine's problem wasn't the machine, it was the thread (it broke almost as badly on the rented machine). And later, after doing a little research, I learned that if the quilt frame is not level and square, it can cause the machine to sew badly. I decided to give my old machine another chance. I had a half-finished quilt top in a box in my sewing room, and I dragged it out and finished it. The Husband helped me level and square-up the quilt frame. I cleaned the machine, loaded the quilt, and started the quilting.
The one thing that our leveling and squaring didn't fix was the "bump" in the center of the quilt frame where it joins together. There must be a way to fix this, but I haven't found it. It's just a tiny bump, but the sewing machine, gliding smoothly along on rails, hits that bump like it's a concrete wall. Since there are wheels on both sides of the machine, it hits the wall again when the second set of wheels goes over it. It causes bobbles in the sewing - all of my quilts have twin sets of bobbles smack down the center. Today, hitting that bump caused me to SEW THROUGH MY LITTLE FINGER. TWICE, it happened so fast.
When I finally disentangled myself from the sewing machine, there were 3 inches of thread hanging out of both sides (top and bottom) of my finger. I came about as close to fainting as I have ever come.
