Overloaded

You know how I love a bargain and I especially love FREE so you can imagine how excited I was to be invited to take a look at a bunch of free sewing machines. Actually, I was dragging my heels a bit because I'm still cleaning out the garage in an effort to get my car in before the first snow. Three cabinets were donated on Monday night so I wasn't as excited as I might be to go looking on Tuesday but Ellie asked me to go and I can hardly say no to her. I picked her up and in five minutes we were at Judy's house, snaking our way into her basement to peruse her leftovers.

Judy was part of a project to send sewing machines to Uganda so when the shipping container was full of the best machines there were some that didn't make the cut. Ellie asked me to come and help her select those appropriate for Haiti since I've been a part of her project for several years. Anything I wanted I could also have since Judy was at the end of her project and was looking to get her car back in the garage, too. I wasn't prepared for what I saw: a storage room that was covered with sewing machines, probably forty in all. There were labels/notes about the problems and I recognized many by their cases so we could say an immediate no to some modern Singers, vintage Touch and Sew models, and problematic Elna's.. But what was left...

The Haul.

filled the back of my vehicle. Bernina, Kenmore, Riccar, Singer, Viking, I was a little breathless! Then we made our way to the garage. Lining both sides were treadles, cabinets, and heads in boxes. We looked, pulled them out, and labeled. We decided it was time to organize so we put the keepers all to one side and those she was going to dispose of on the other side. There were two treadles with vibrating shuttles that were not going to Haiti since in Haiti they need standard needles and bobbins.  Ellie took photos and posted them as free on Facebook Marketplace and they were going to be picked up within the next hour! As we moved cabinets we continued to find even more and then I found it, that one I'm always looking for. It was a New Home treadle in a small enclosed cabinet, all in good shape. Perfect!

New Home treadle cabinet

By now we were trying to figure out how to get the cabinet models to Ellie's and she immediately came up with a plan: On Sunday she would come back to Judy's with a larger SUV/truck and bring muscle. They would come over to my house and drop off the one cabinet I wanted and two Singer's with potted motors and at the same time pick up the machines that I had looked over and gave my seal of approval for sending to Haiti. I spend most of Saturday getting Ellie's machines ready and in the end she gave two back to me. On Sunday night she brought three boxes of machines and parts and the beloved New Home treadle. Here's how my garage floor looks:

There's a floor under those sewing machines!

But I'll keep working my way through the pile, finding the treasures and discarding broken parts. I don't have the time to really take care of the New Home treadle but I did open it up:

New Home vibrating shuttle

and brought the accessories inside. Wow, there was a treasure trove of long bobbins, round bobbins, accessory sets, and even an original manual:

Accessories with the New Home treadle

All was sorted and put back into boxes to go with the New Home treadle or into the assortment of extra feet or bobbins. There was a nice set of needles for the treadle, too, something I probably didn't own and now will be able to test out this machine. But first we are going to get that car back in the garage ASAP since snow is coming this week.

An exciting time with Ellie, but isn't it always?, and I'm sure I ended up ahead in this transaction. She is sure she's getting more than her money's worth. We are both lovin' it, getting machines ready and sewing up a storm!