Sewing Machine question, skirt, and three bags.

[asthenia18220.livejournal.com]

I got a sewing machine for Christmas in 7th grade, sewed some but eventually didn't have money to keep up with all I wanted to do. I moved a lot, and my sewing machine followed. Now I'm seventeen, and for the past year I've been hand sewing everything. It's so much harder, the outcome isn't as good as a sewing machine and it's time consuming. I tried hooking up my sewing machine. I couldn't figure out how to thread it, and when I finally thought I'd done it right- I turned on my sewing machine to see if all went well. If I remember correctly, nothing happened. No movement. I'm not sure if it's broken, or I'm just completely stupid. It's a really nice sewing machine, too. )-:

Anyway, I now have a job and if I can't fix that one, I'm going to invest in a new one. I mainly want to make skirts and bags. I don't want the cheapest there is, but I don't want to spend tons of money. Something simple and sturdy. I'm thinking of buying one from Sears (where I got my old one.) Here's all the sewing machines available. Can anyone direct me towards which one might be best? I don't know much about them, so I need some advice. I also have stores like Wal Mart, KMart, and Target so if you've gotten a sewing machine from there maybe you could give me information on it. Thanks a lot for reading all of that and for any help you can give me...

And here are a few things I've done:


This was completely hand sewn. You can tell it's a bit messy, but I thought I did an alright job.




I'm currently working on this: I'm adding a few more things. I had to get thread because I'm putting bumblebees on it and I just got some today.

I made this a while ago:



That's the D.A.R.E lion. (-:


I made this skirt. (all hand sewn). It didn't turn out the way I wanted it to but I'll still wear it sometimes.

I have so many great ideas in my head for skirts, shirts and bags I'd like to make but once you sew for hours and hours straight- you never want to sew again. Haha.