Had a few folks interested in how I made the patches I posted for Solarpunk Aesthetic Week, so I thought I'd give y'all my step-by-step process for making hand-embroidered patches!
First, choose your fabric and draw on your design. You can use basically any fabric for this - for this project I'm using some felt I've had lying around in my stash for ages.
Next, choose your embroidery floss. For my patches I split my embroidery floss into two threads with 3 strands each, as pictured. You can use as many strands in your thread as you prefer, but for the main body of my patches I prefer 3 strands.
Next you're going to start filling your design using a back stitch.
First, put in a single stitch where you want your row to start.
Poke your needle up through the fabric 1 stitch-length away from your first stitch.
Poke your needle back down the same hole your last stitch went into so they line up end-to-end.
Repeat until you have a row of your desired length (usually the length of that colour section from one end to the other). Once you have your first row, you're going to do your next row slightly offset from your first row so that your stitches lay together in a brick pattern like this:
Make sure your rows of stitches are tight together, or you'll get gaps where the fabric shows through.
Rinse and repeat with rows of back stitch to fill in your patch design.
When you're almost to the end of your thread, poke your needle through to the back of the fabric and pull the thread under the back part of the stitching to tuck in the end. Don't worry if it looks messy - no one's gonna see the back anyway.
This next step is fully optional, but I think it makes the patch design really pop. Once your patch is filled in, you can use black embroidery floss to outline your design (or whatever colour you want to outline with - it's your patch, do what you want). I use the full thread (6 strands, not split) of embroidery floss to make a thicker outline.
I use the same back stitch I used to fill the piece to make an outline that adds some separation and detail. You could use most any 'outlining' stitch for this, but I just use back stitch because it's just easier for me to do.
Once you're finished embroidering your patch, it's time to cut it out!
Make sure to leave a little border around the edge to use for sewing your patch on your jacket/bag/blanket/whatever, and be careful not to accidentally cut through the stitches on the back of the patch.
If you have a sturdy enough fabric that isn't going to fray, you can just leave it like this. If not, I recommend using a whip stitch/satin stitch to seal in the exposed edges (I find that splitting your embroidery floss into 3-strand threads works best for this).
And then you're done! At this point you can put on iron-on backing if you want, or just sew it on whatever you wanna put it on. Making patches this way does take a long time, but I feel that the results are worth it.
Thanks for reading this tutorial! I hope it was helpful. If anyone makes patches using this method, I'd love to see them! 😁
i loosely followed thedimelions’s tutorial for naturally dyeing a pride flag, with a lot of added research about natural dyes, stains, mordants, sewing, etc, and i wanted to share my results!!
process, notes, and more pics under the read more🌱
starting off i soaked my fabric (100% cotton acquired from joann's during their closing sale, rip joann's ;-;) in a 1:5 mixture of soy milk and water for 12 hours, then let dry on a clothesline in the sun, then dipped and dried two more times (the proteins in the soy milk help the natural dyes adhere to the fabric, creating darker colors and better colorfastness)
while that was happening i started making my dyes, which involved simmering my chosen dyestuffs in some water for 30-60 minutes. i didnt time it, just went until the color developed to a point i was happy with
as far as ratios i didn’t measure, but the more dyestuff = stronger color so err on the side of more
red: turmeric + baking soda, paprika, and yellow onion skin dye as the liquid base
orange: yellow onion skins
yellow: turmeric
green: red cabbage + baking powder (LOTS), turmeric
blue: red cabbage + baking powder
purple: red cabbage
for the red cabbage dyes, i added the baking powders and soda after simmering and just kept adding and stirring till i got the color i wanted. ((BIG NOTE red cabbage, and debatably most of the others that I used, are fugitive dyes, meaning its not a true dye and more of a stain that will fade with time and wash out more easily, especially without mordanting on additives like iron. keep this in mind if you end up doing this project or transfering these methods to cloth you will be using for clothes, ie washing and wearing more frequently))
i also tried to make a pink with avocado skins and pits, which did come out a lovely rosy color, but i didn’t end up using in the final flag, which i might use beet or red cabbage + lemon juice or another acidified for next time to get a more bright pink
now with my dyes ready and my cloth dried out from its previous soy milk dip i cut it into strips and stuck it in the jars, which were placed in the sun for the day (alternatively, you could simmer the cloth in the pot) and then left to sit overnight
the next day i squeezed out the excess dye and gave the ones with turmeric a light rinse to get the grit out, then hung them to dry
((small note i reused the dyes baths to see what would happen since they still looked just as pigmented, but the colors are much much much more faded on the second go around. all in all its doable, but I wouldn't recommend it.))
now time to sew! i procured a second hand sewing machine specifically for this project and had never sewed before, but thankfully this required the easiest stitch in the game (a straight stitch in a straight line). i looked up how to sew a flag specifically to get those clean lines rather than just overlapping, and this video was great (shoutout Suffolk Public Library)
as you can see my flag ended up quite long cause I left a lot of wiggle room, so I just look up flag ratios, trimmed it up (and used the extra strip of rainbow as decoration) then added a white strip folded over to make a way for me to hang it on a stick if I ever so desire.
and ta daaa! i would still like to clean it up a bit, and do a zig zag stitch around the outside to stop the cloth from fraying further, but im happy with the unpolished look of it. once i figure out how to get a pink I like, and how to get browns and blacks, i want to make a progress flag and trans flag. also just started growing some indigo, so excited to see if I can get some blue dyes out of that.
I’m going to sound insane for a sec but I feel like people are forgetting that casual players of Minecraft exist. The other day I saw someone talk about how no one uses mounts anymore because everyone uses elytra’s and it’s like HUH?? What are you on about bro 😭 wtf are you on about. Getting a horse used to be the biggest deal to me and it still is. Today I got into an argument about how Minecraft isn’t a game about colonialism because unless you choose to play as a colonist than it’s about love. It’s always been about love. No one is forcing you to make villager farms that’s all you man. I am just building a house and enjoying myself
no because actually, you dont understand. there will always be people who will feel complete, whatever the job is.
help the elders? teach our children? there are people who love old people and kids.
cook? fix things? create electronics? keep everything clean? some people live for it.
you can take every job, you will always find someone who will do it willingly because they will find it attractive for whatever reason. i knew a guy whose job was to collect trash in the street and he loved his job because he woke up early and finished early. he basically had all the day for himself and he loved doing basically nothing all day.
but college is expensive, people need to eat, to pay their rent, to pay their bills. depending on their dreams and their career, they dont even have the time to ask themselves if their current job fulfills them. and some of they dont even consider that they have a choice. and ultimately, they are right. in our current economic system, they cant choose. cant afford higher education if they want to do a more "theorical" job.
im sorry but your capitalist society doesnt sound right to me
“Yeah but like you probably at least use chatgpt for—” let me stop you right there. I don’t even know what chatgpt is, software wise. Is it a desktop program, a website, an app? No fucking idea.
You might be more than one. You might be different ones at different times. 🫶🏽🫶🏽 you might not be one of these. There are more roles 💪🏽 but this is an amazing intro.
You can’t just like the idea and envision yourself in one of these roles you have to figure out how to be about it ♥️🫶🏽
je regarde le commentaires audio du film vdf et euuuh... COMMENT ÇA ON A FAILLI AVOIR UNE SCENE QUI CANON LE HENRISITEUR ?!?!??!? (encore plus :P)
alors *spoil mineur* (techniquement pas vraiment spoil en fait, je sais pas ._.)
dans la scène du bar où Raph et le Visiteur discutent de prendre Alice dans l'équipe, y'a eu une impro entre florent dorin et raphaël descraques sur où allait dormir Alice et le Visiteur répond "dans ta chambre" et de fil en aiguilles, ils disaient que Raph avait brisé l'intimité du Visiteur et de Henry en tant que couple :D
et françois descraques a hésité... MAIS IL L'A COUPÉE CETTE SCÈNE ! :(((
No, actually, i want cables and not bluetooth, i don't want touchscreens, i want buttons and knobs, i want to be able to take the battery out of my phone, i want to charge my phone and plug in head phones at the same time, i want a cd drive in my laptop and not have to buy an external drive, i want a car without a display, i want to turn on the lights with a switch not with my voice, i want to have a paper cinema ticket not a QR code, i want to listen to illegally burned music on a 00s cd player, i want to watch movies that i actually own, i want to read news once a day on paper, i want to aimlessly flick through magazines and not doomscroll on social media, i want to write emails and not talk to chatbots, i want to own stuff without hundreds of digital subscriptions, i want