Estate Sale Find - Singer #42 Bench Full of Goodies!

I still love Estate Sales!

My all time favorite Singer cabinet has always been the #42, with it's cool Art Deco styling and its beautiful finish and sturdy build.  It is a nice piece of furniture in its own right.  I found one several years ago, and it is a beauty, but I never had the matching stool and always hoped to find one.

I'm good at biding my time, because eventually one will show up.  It took five years but I found it! 

Singer #42 cabinet and stool

It was only $15 and as a bonus, it was packed with goodies!  The coolest thing was the packet for the Singer Sewing course which was offered for free when you bought a Singer machine in the 1940s-50s.

Singer Sewing Course - Six Lessons

Lesson One:  Seams in different fabrics, matching plaids, sewing curves.  Paper template included to practice sewing straight lines and circles

Lesson Two:  Sewing darts and gathers

Lesson Three:  Sewing trims and pipings using the edgestitch foot.  Our seamstress didn't do so well here.

This is Lesson Three in the Sewing Skills booklet

Lesson Four:  Doing free-motion embroidery following stamped design.  Our seamstress did such a bad job at this that I picked most of it out!

Lessons Five & Six:  Our seamstress never completed these lessons but according to the booklet, Lesson Five was installing zippers and Lesson Six was doing hem finishes.

I know I'm kind of weird, but I really enjoyed going through these lessons and imagining our seamstress taking time from her household chores back in 1955 to sit down at her Singer 99K and practice these skills.