Looks like you have pretty good answers, here ia a flower 4U
i have 2 wilcom and corel drawings x3 and still learning them
Cindy I have embird digitizing SW. got it 4 Christmas but haven't bothered or taken the time to learn it all. that's what Simplyrosie /Teri uses & she has done a remarkable job. *
I use Husqvarna Vikings 3D Professional and find it very user friendly, but there are alot of programes available, they also have a digitising progam available as a stand alone package but from memory I think you need 3D customizing first to go with it. Go to the embroidery machine sites like Brother, Husqvarna etc and have a read and then maybe it's a good idea to visit a few shops and get them to show you. Once you decide you can often pick up on Ebay what you are looking for at a reasonable cost - just make sure if you buy second hand that things like the dongle (security usb key) is included. No good program is cheap. But the old story is it is very hard to do a good job with bad tools - Have fun!
You buy a program. I don't know the prices in $. What I do know is quite a few people here use Embird (SimplyRosie a.o.). Others, myself included, use programs made by the machine manufacturer, Janome, Viking (I have 3D Pro), Brother (PEDesign). You can research them on their respective sites. Under the tag "software"you can also find some info. But no doubt a lot of Cuties will answer you here as well.
You'll need to purchase digitizing software. I tested several and found I truly loved Embird the best. HOWEVER, I would strongly encourage that whatever you end up purchasing, invest in good tutorials. This will save you months of learning how to use your new tool (possibly incorrectly). Also, I recommend John Deer's "Digitizing Made Easy" to learn some of the key components to proper digitizing. :-) Hope this helps.