Momma is a very happy seamstress!

Monogrammer, Buttonholer, and Letter Disks

Letter Disks A-Z

So here is my latest E-Bay purchase for Betti, my Singer 503 Rocketeer. I can now do professional looking buttonholes and monograms for small gifts and other trinkets!
Pictured first is the box of complete monogramming disks for the Singer monogrammer. I originally wanted the professional one, but they are very hard to find with a complete set of letters. Often customers purchased only the letters they thought they would need for the Professional Monogrammer.

Monogrammer by Singer

Next is the actual monogrammer. One day I might get the other one, but I think I shall have to learn this one first. Stitch Nerd has a great description of a collection of monogrammers and other attachments for vintage Singers and Kenmores. Also, Charlene Philips, the author of The Sewing Machine Attachment Handbook and leading authority on vintage attachments, gives a very useful and detailed description of the feed cover plates. Since they are not interchangeable  her post is quite useful, as it includes pictures to illustrate the differences.

Singer Professional Buttonholer

 The following picture is the buttonholer with the correct feed cover plate (the ever elusive #161825, below) for my machine. I now have two buttonholers, but I will probably sell one of them.

Feed Cover Plate #161825

Another great source for information on Vintage Singer sewing machines is the Sew-Classic blog by Jenny. In particular, she discusses the features of the Singer 401, 403 and Slant-o-matic 500 series machines. I find her blog to be a great reference because I have both the 501 and 503 (Betti).
Yeah, me! I get to do some great sewing in the future. I am so excited to see what these bad boys can do with tea towels and such. Christmas is a bit close for me to crank out some gifts on my new toys, but I will try to learn them.
If you are in the market for a vintage machine, please please make sure you do all sorts of homework and research on what you think you might want and what is a good price. Often Ebay sellers can start with a low price, but woe be the buyer who gets in a bidding war. Just be careful and know what you need first. Descriptions can be wrong because the seller did not do enough research (read: they just want the money).
Happy Stitching.