Bernina Stitch Regulator: Love at First Stitch!

I'm in love!

As I think I've mentioned before, I take a Dear Jane class at The City Quilter once a month. Well, I was in the shop today for class and checking out the new classroom sewing machines from Bernina. I have a Bernina at home (different model, though), so most of the computer buttons were familiar. But, there were a few I couldn't figure out. I asked my teacher about them and she invited me to give the BSR (Bernina Stitch Regulator) a try.

How fun!

What is the BSR? Well, basically it's a magical computerized foot that regulates the stitch length when you're free motion quilting. If you're not familiar with machine quilting, let me tell you it takes many years to be good enough to self-regulate the size of your stitches. Here's a drawing of the difference:

The BSR allows the quilter to get perfect, even stitches every time! Very cool!

Now, I had heard a lot of negative stuff about the BSR. "If you already know how to free motion quilt, it's annoying." "It's too slow!" Etc. So, I was thrilled to get the chance to try it out myself. There are two settings BSR 1 and BSR 2. In BSR 1 the motor is always running and in BSR 2, it's only running when the fabric is moving. I hated BSR 1. It was impossible for me to go the correct speed! If you go too fast, the machine beeps and stitch is not regulated. BSR 2, however, was a dream! I sped along at a nice clip and my stitches looked fabulous! After about forty minutes of playing around, I decided to try out a small whole cloth quilt. Here it is:

And a close up:

The thing that I loved about using the BSR was that while quilting, I only had to focus on one thing (the shapes I was making) rather than two (the shapes and the stitch length). I wish that my current machine could be retrofitted for the foot. But, alas, I don't think it's possible.

Sigh.

So, I'm saving my pennies and looking forward to my next class!