Blog Post 3: Hurry up and Wait. First stitch will have to be another day.
Not so fast wannabe!
My machine was scheduled to arrive 2-4 weeks after I purchased it. It ended up shipping closer to the two week mark and I wasn’t going to be home to receive it! Go figure. I called the local shipping company and set the delivery for the first day they could deliver it after I returned home. My machine was ready for me, but I wasn’t ready for it. Little did I know this was going to be a reoccurring theme for my start in embroidery.
Delivery day finally arrived. I cleared out the space in the closet that I would be running my new embroidery empire from and eagerly awaited the sounds of the 18 wheeler pulling into the cul-de-sac. The driver called me to ask for directions finding my house so I was able to be outside waiting when he pulled up.
Now I’ve never seen my machine outside of the website and some YouTube videos so I really didn't have a sense for how big this machine really is. The fact that it was coming on an 18-wheeler on a pallet was starting to make me question if my closet was going to be big enough to be the home of my new Ricoma baby. The driver was fantastic and probably also happy because my machine was the last thing on his rig. He throws open the back of the trailer and gets his little pallet mover machine in place. After hoisting up the pallet, which contains my investment, he maneuvers his way into my garage and drops off the pallet which consists of two big boxes and smaller one. I check the packing slip and check the boxes for any visible damage.
I’ll be honest here; it was a cursory glance. As long as it wasn’t moldy or making funny clanky noises as he dropped it off I was going to want to sign for my machine. Lucky for me nothing appeared to be damaged and I signed for delivery and waited for him to get down the driveway before I started squealing with excitement and doing my happy dance. It was at this point my husband shook his head at me and walked back inside.
As I unwrapped it was clear I was going to need some help moving this thing into the house and up the stairs. After some spousal negotiating and me very loudly trying to move pieces of it myself; my husband came to assist me moving the stand and then the machine upstairs. Lucky for me the training videos covered how to put the stand together so that part when pretty smoothly. It was the trying to remove one of the Rubbermaid wire shelves in the closet that had me using very colorful language. How could I possibly finally have my machine and a stupid wire rack was stopping me from putting it in the closest in a way that the power would run to it?!
My goodwill with my spouse at this point was gone so I let the shelf win that round and just put my machine where it could fit. It looked amazing!
Now back to the training videos. They require you complete nine videos at this point to schedule your live training. If you don’t do the live training and turn on your machine prior to the live training they say it can void your warranty. Needless to say, I was too nervous to even turn the machine now. I go through the nine videos which tell you how to thread the machine and lots of other useful information. Once again, everything they demonstrate in the videos seems pretty easy to accomplish in real life, but maybe that was just my hubris.
Threading the machine was interesting. It comes pre threaded, but I ended up having some issues to where I had to learn how to completely thread the machine. When I finally got through all of them, I was ready to hit that scheduled training button. Little did I know that the next offering of the machine learning course was five days away. The horror! Imagine buying yourself a fancy new Tesla and then finding out you can’t actually drive it for five days until you do an online training. Ugh.
My recommendation for anyone else who is getting a new machine is to schedule the training for as soon as possible. Don’t be like me and wait for the machine to arrive and be all unboxed. Schedule for the first one you can and if you can’t make that one, you’ll get an option to cancel it. You'll likely still have time to get the machine all prepped as it states you need to prior to the training. Don't skip that part though! Actually complete those tasks. It'll help you get through the training when you do finally get a chance to attend. For now it's just another example of my machine being ready before me again. Hopefully one day I'll be able to turn it on. Now you know why this post is called hurry up and wait.
Delivery day finally arrived. I cleared out the space in the closet that I would be running my new embroidery empire from and eagerly awaited the sounds of the 18 wheeler pulling into the cul-de-sac. The driver called me to ask for directions finding my house so I was able to be outside waiting when he pulled up.
Now I’ve never seen my machine outside of the website and some YouTube videos so I really didn't have a sense for how big this machine really is. The fact that it was coming on an 18-wheeler on a pallet was starting to make me question if my closet was going to be big enough to be the home of my new Ricoma baby. The driver was fantastic and probably also happy because my machine was the last thing on his rig. He throws open the back of the trailer and gets his little pallet mover machine in place. After hoisting up the pallet, which contains my investment, he maneuvers his way into my garage and drops off the pallet which consists of two big boxes and smaller one. I check the packing slip and check the boxes for any visible damage.
I’ll be honest here; it was a cursory glance. As long as it wasn’t moldy or making funny clanky noises as he dropped it off I was going to want to sign for my machine. Lucky for me nothing appeared to be damaged and I signed for delivery and waited for him to get down the driveway before I started squealing with excitement and doing my happy dance. It was at this point my husband shook his head at me and walked back inside.
As I unwrapped it was clear I was going to need some help moving this thing into the house and up the stairs. After some spousal negotiating and me very loudly trying to move pieces of it myself; my husband came to assist me moving the stand and then the machine upstairs. Lucky for me the training videos covered how to put the stand together so that part when pretty smoothly. It was the trying to remove one of the Rubbermaid wire shelves in the closet that had me using very colorful language. How could I possibly finally have my machine and a stupid wire rack was stopping me from putting it in the closest in a way that the power would run to it?!
My goodwill with my spouse at this point was gone so I let the shelf win that round and just put my machine where it could fit. It looked amazing!
Now back to the training videos. They require you complete nine videos at this point to schedule your live training. If you don’t do the live training and turn on your machine prior to the live training they say it can void your warranty. Needless to say, I was too nervous to even turn the machine now. I go through the nine videos which tell you how to thread the machine and lots of other useful information. Once again, everything they demonstrate in the videos seems pretty easy to accomplish in real life, but maybe that was just my hubris.
Threading the machine was interesting. It comes pre threaded, but I ended up having some issues to where I had to learn how to completely thread the machine. When I finally got through all of them, I was ready to hit that scheduled training button. Little did I know that the next offering of the machine learning course was five days away. The horror! Imagine buying yourself a fancy new Tesla and then finding out you can’t actually drive it for five days until you do an online training. Ugh.
My recommendation for anyone else who is getting a new machine is to schedule the training for as soon as possible. Don’t be like me and wait for the machine to arrive and be all unboxed. Schedule for the first one you can and if you can’t make that one, you’ll get an option to cancel it. You'll likely still have time to get the machine all prepped as it states you need to prior to the training. Don't skip that part though! Actually complete those tasks. It'll help you get through the training when you do finally get a chance to attend. For now it's just another example of my machine being ready before me again. Hopefully one day I'll be able to turn it on. Now you know why this post is called hurry up and wait.
Harder Than It Looks!
Read what happens next! Blog Post 4