Machine embroidery is awesome!

So I spent the whole day getting to know my machine. It was a love hate relationship, and nothing seemed to go right at first. I first chose my pattern from Urban Threads. I love their stuff! I chose an 8 color cherry blossom tree. I got all set up. I ironed on my stabilizer, and chose my thread.  

It went pretty badly from there. Thread kept breaking, the white thread from the bobbing underneath started coming through, my bobbing ran out of thread. It kept going. There's a pile threads on my craft desk that look like some drunken spiders had a party. I read the manual and consulted google and kept experimenting till I was pretty sure I had figured it out. The tension and pressure had been way too high, and the thread was cheap. So I changed my bobbin thread and abandoned my cherry blossoms.

So I cleaned out the machine, chose new thread, wound some new bobbins with some much higher quality thread (that was an adventure... the spool is huge!) and then I chose a new pattern from Urban Threads again. I stabilized my fabric and put it in the hoop and put it on the machine.

I changed the needle for a nice new sharp one and set it to run!

Then when it was done (almost an hour later) I took it off the hoop, removed the excess stabilizer from the back And voila!!

Isn't it cool! The detail is fantastic! Now I just have to cut it and sew it into a cuppow cozy! I may get distracted by a few more embroidery pieces first though.