Gertrude

Gertrude. She's my 2003 Janome New Home My Excel 15S. She's named after my great great grandmother on my mother's side who immigrated here from Amsterdam. This is possibly the best machine I've ever, ever used. Okay, I've used one that's better, (thanks, Harvey,) but I think I generally prefer the guttural noises of heavy, greasy metal parts working in sync than the mosquito-like whizzing whir of the newer, fancier machines.

Anyway, I've had this machine for nine years, and I love her. I've sewn every piece of garb, every project, everything on her and nothing has ever gone wrong.

Until a few months ago, when something I did ... did something.

"CLACKBANG!" is never the sound you want to hear your sewing machine make.

Anyway the first thing to go wrong was the feed dog assembly- it stopped working. My husband fixed it, and oh was that ever brave of him. But while fixing that, he managed to completely throw off the timing of the hook and the pickup and oh no. We had to take it in- I wasn't about to make five people's worth of garb entirely by hand. No sir.

$151 later, my machine is running smooth as silk, with umpteen little out of whack tweaks fixed and boy did it set me back, but then I have to think about it like this; would I have paid $17 a year to have my machine in good working order all the time? Well then, there it is. $151 well spent- I guess.