I started sewing when I was about 7, making clothes for my dolls. My mother didn't sew, so there was no sewing machine in our house - when I got to my teens I used to make dresses for myself by hand! Eventually I managed to buy myself an electric sewing machine, straight stitch only, from my mother's club book, paying weekly for 40 weeks. I was in heaven . I made all my clothes then, including a pure wool trouser suit with matching skirt, and a couple of lightweight summer suits. I also made my wedding dress and the three bridesmaids' dresses on that machine, using pinking shears to finish the seams, as I didn't have zigzag stitch.
It served me well, until some years later when I upgraded it to a machine with zigzag. All my DD's clothes were made on that machine, plus much of my clothing. I gradually stopped dressmaking as DD grew up and have only recently rekindled my love of sewing with the arrival of my DGD last year. And I am thoroughly enjoying making her dresses, rompers, dungarees and so on with my lovely new computerised machine