Nitty Gritty
Everything you need to know about the Fabulous Free Motion online course, including what you'll need and the timetable for lessons.
As I’ve been answering people’s questions about the course, it occurred to me it’d make sense if I put them here for everyone 🙂
What do I need?
I’ve tried my very best to keep the requirements to things that you’ll probably have anyway. The whole point of the course is to make free motion embroidery accessible to everyone, and that includes the things you stitch with and on!
Here’s a sneak peek of the Requirements lesson with a video run through of everything you need, a list and description of each thing, plus a PDF to download and print to make things easier:
Do I need a fancy pants sewing machine?
Absolutely not.
I filmed a lot of the course using an 80 year old Singer that only stitches a straight line! I found a free-motion foot on the manufacturer’s website, and discovered I can drop the feed teeth! Now that was a true revelation - the lever was hidden inside the wooden base and needs me to tip the whole machine out and up to reach, but I’ve had this machine for over 40 years (and it was my mother’s before that) so I was thrilled to discover this feature!
If you’re considering acquiring a new sewing machine at some point, and want to know what I’d recommend, I’ve created this PDF with my list of ‘essential’ features in any machine, and the ‘nice-to-haves’:
Course structure
The course is designed to give a gentle progression from ‘newbie’ towards proficiency. To make this as painless as possible - and fun! - I broke the content into lots of little achievable lessons, short and sweet!
The lessons fit naturally into groups of five, so it made sense to group them into ‘weeks’. But this doesn’t mean you have to do each block in one week, or one on every day! You could save them all up and do them at the weekend, or you could do each one in turn and let it take as long as it takes - and not worry about what day of the week it is. If I was taking my own course, this is probably what I’d do.
What’s the timetable?
Introduction: available immediately on sign up - includes the requirements (see above!) and a few tasks to get ready for the lessons.
Weekly lesson releases: you’ll receive an email when a new section is available, or log-in to the course and you’ll find it all there ready for you:
September 9th: beginner lessons
September 16th: beginner lessons
September 23rd: rest week
September 30th: intermediate lessons
October 7th: intermediate lessons
October 14th: rest week
October 21st: advanced lessons
October 28th: advanced lessons
November 4th: rest week
November 11th: wrap up week
Homework/weekend tasks: Every Thursday, a small group of further tasks are unlocked. These vary from finding or preparing a few things or going for a walk. There’s a mini project in there too: optional but fun.
Rest weeks: There are three rest weeks in total. No lessons in these weeks, only a few prompts to help you reflect on your progress so far, and consider how you will approach the next batch of lessons. Use the time for reflection, practise, catch-up on the lessons - or rest!
Here’s a printable version of the full schedule:
NB There’s absolutely no requirement to stick to this if it’s too much and too fast. You get forever access, so follow along in your own time, and take as long as you need.
What happens after I sign up and how do I find the course again?
You’ll receive a confirmation email with a link back to the course. If you lose the link, just log back into my courses website (use the email and password you set at checkout) which will take you straight to your profile where you’ll see a list of all the courses you’ve ever purchased from me.
The log-in button is the top right of the page.
You’ll notice that the Fabulous Free Motion Introduction is a separate ‘product’ from the lessons - meaning that it’s available immediately. Click on it, and it’ll take you through to the tasks. They’re ready and waiting for you!
To find the lessons, you’ll need to go back to your profile, click ‘products’ then click Fabulous Free Motion Lessons. You’ll then be able to see the list of sections and lessons on the left-hand side, but everything’s locked until the appropriate date.
The eagle-eyed might spot start date of 8 September on the website. This is just a tech thing I’ve had to do in order to schedule email notifications: the first lessons will unlock on 9 September.
In case you missed it, here’s a video of me explaining more or less what I’ve said above. It also gives you a chance to see the sort of thing we’ll be stitching, in the background as I’m talking 🙂
Finally, don’t forget…
Subscribers get a discount - check the link at the top of your email (or message me if you can’t find it)
Doors close on SATURDAY evening, bedtime BST because we start on Monday 9th