My Baby has to go to the Doctor

My sewing machine baby, that is! This is the machine that I inherited from my grandmother. It was given to her when she got married in the '40's and it is a workhorse. I learned how to sew on it and it only does a straight stitch. It's one of those machines that the manual says never needs to be oiled. Hmm....not sure about that. Of course, in the 15 years I've owned it, I've never oiled it, so maybe there is something to that - I don't know.

Anyway, I bought a new Singer a couple of years ago and was instantly enamored of it, so the Kenmore went into retirement in the cupboard. It wasn't a computerized machine, but the Singer could do all kinds of different stitches and had a walking foot!

Because I am a sporadic machine user, it took me a couple of years to discover the thing that made me decide to switch back. The Singer's feed dogs were a LOT farther apart than what I was used to on the Kenmore. I didn't think it was such a big deal until I noticed I wasn't getting the accuracy I was used to with the Kenmore...Hmm....so, the two machines switched, the Kenmore came out of retirement and the Singer went to live in the cupboard.

Unfortunately, I learned that this particular cupboard isn't insulated, and the Kenmore had a squeak when it first started working. However, this disappeared within 10 seconds, so I wasn't too concerned. Then, yesterday, while I was in the throes of my Halloween quilt, the foot pedal started to stick! I'd take my foot off it and it would keep sewing! Ack!

I asked DH if he would put some WD40 in the pedal for me - which he did...and then it wouldn't sew at all :( So now I have to take it in to be serviced and I don't know any of the servicemen's reputations around here. I know of at least two different service shops near me, but don't know anything about them. I'm leary of giving them my baby, since this particular machine means a lot to me....Guess I'm off to make a few phone calls!