I’ve been sewing on a Brother XR-52 machine for about six years now. Over the last few years my Brother has become increasingly ill-behaved. First, its tension control dial stopped working correctly and constant fiddling became necessary to produce even remotely normal stitches. I thought maybe a tune-up would help- it didn’t. And then about six months ago the machine became completely incorrigible. It started doing all sorts of random bizarre stitches. Being the perfectionist that I am, I couldn’t handle the thought of something I spent hours meticulously sewing falling to pieces because of my Brother’s inadequacy.

After my most recent sewing project, a baby blanket, took much longer to complete than it should have, thanks to my naughty Brother, I decided that that was it. I needed a new sewing machine and I needed it NOW! Jason caught my hints, well more like demands, and bought me a new sewing machine for our anniversary. My new machine, a Singer Confidence 7470, is lovely. It has an electronic display, memory capabilities, 225 built-in stitches, 7 one-step buttonholes, and one-touch stitch selection. But far more important than any of these other niceties, it has automatic tension control. Yes! No more continual tension adjustments; my happiness is now complete! If only all defective brothers were as easy to replace.