Husqvarna Viking Machine

 I was at the store with my friend this afternoon and we wandered by a display that said "Singer - Heavy Duty" machines.   Because I've been pondering getting a sewing machine that can do tougher stuff, i.e. repairing horse blankets and making saddle pads and equipment bags, I was tempted by the sale.  However, upon closer inspection I learned the innards were actually partly plastic, partly metal, and so not as heavy duty as it appeared.  The woman at the store said that particular machine will usually be returned within the first month because something inside has broken. I then wandered over to these Husqvarna Viking machines.  I sat down and tried it in the store - I watched it go through 7 layers of tightly folded denim in one pass like it was nothing.  This machine even will go through leather if you use the right needle and thread, just what I want to get through 1600 denier nylon waterproof horse blankets that need repair, and heavy canvas sheets with nylon webbing straps.

 To familiarize myself with it I filled bobbins and sewed some scrap horse show ribbons together, then I jumped right in and made this with scrap stuff I had:

Finally, I was happy to get it because I can do all of the stuff needed to finish this horse show ribbon quilt with my own machine rather than send it to someone else to finish.  It will easily go through all the layers of slippery fabric to quilt the whole thing together with just changing some small parts and settings.  It's a super simple machine but tough enough to go through the stuff I want to do - and it was a great price!  Who knew I could be so domestic?  This is the ribbon quilt so far:

 This is a heavy cotton sheet patched with an old pair of my jeans (I wore out the jeans riding, nothing like swinging your leg into the saddle and hearing the seat of your pants split).  The machine had no problem going through it.

This was two layers of nylon webbing, two layers of fleece, and denim from jeans for the patches.  Again, no issue at all for the machine.  The next attempt was putting the tail flap back on a blanket (no pics, sorry), and the machine went through 4 layers of tightly folded nylon webbing plus 2 layers of 1200 denier nylon like it was butter.  Good deal.  These horse clothes were ready to be trashed, and repairing them was simple.  To replace the horse blankets I fixed this weekend would have cost more than the machine did - it has already paid for itself!