'It's the book I wish came with my first machine.' Machine embroidery is so much more than just loading a design into your machine and stitching it out on whatever is under the needle. Just like a recipe for baking cookies, we have ingredients, equipment, and instructions to follow. What ingredients we select - design, fabric, threads - affects other choices such as hooping methods, stabilizers, and needles. In this comprehensive book, Lindee Goodall, founder and former owner of Cactus Punch, the first independent company to design embroidery specifically for the home market, gives you everything you need to know to produce quality embroidery no matter how small and basic or large and fancy your machine. Whether you're brand new to machine embroidery or an old hand, you're sure to find useful tips and tricks you can apply immediately Included in the book are lots of links to additional online resources. You'll also find a set of designs for experimenting with different threads and techniques as well as checking your thread tensions. Use the handy Design Evaluation form to track your own projects and build your own reference library. Machine embroidery can be fun - and it's even more fun when you know how to get predictably good results time after time Nothing is more frustrating than spending a lot of time and care on a project and not having it turn out. This book represents nearly a quarter of a century of experience from Lindee, so you can jump-start yours. Foreword by Deborah Jones