Fleabag Ornaments

I love Fleabag--a brilliant show created by and starring Phoebe Waller-Bridge (on Amazon Prime). There are a lot of great parts and elements (and it's consistently funny), but my favorite thing is the truly loving, complex sister relationship. 

In part? I think Fleabag's character stating "This is a love story" at the beginning of Season 2 is just as much in reference to sister-love as it is to romantic love. 

And so? I made Fleabag sister ornaments. 

Fleabag:

 Claire:

Shirley Chisholm: Black History Month

I've made ornaments of Maxine Waters, Michelle Obama, Maya Angelou, Angela Davis, and more. My voice isn't the one that should be heard the loudest in celebrating these accomplished women. However, these are women that I admire and that deserve representation, recognition, and...maybe felt ornament portraits? I'm not even scratching the surface on who I'd like to make: Zora Neale Hurston, Josephine Baker, Sojourner Truth, Marian Anderson, Bessie Smith, Mae Jemison, and on and on and on.

This Shirley Chisholm quote was brought to my attention when, in her swearing-in, @tamayaforcincy brought a folding chair. Badass. 

"If they don't give you a seat at the table, bring a folding chair."

Go out and do your magnificent things.

With the sentencing of Larry Nassar to up to 175 years in prison for sexually assaulting many, many young athletes, Judge Rosemarie Aquilina pronounced: "I've just signed your death warrant."

And I was really, really tempted to embroider that on a felt ornament. But alas. Instead I chose a slightly more uplifting quote; her statement to the victims: "Leave your pain here, and go out and do your magnificent things."

Shortened: "Go out and do your magnificent things."

I've been working on a book (yeah, of felt stuff! Feminist felt stuff, to be exact), so I haven't been doing much for myself--but I couldn't let that powerful quote slip by. So here is the honorable Rosemarie Aquilina herself, complete with burgundy highlights.

Star Trek Podcast Fandom

These ornaments/badges have very little popular appeal, I'd imagine. They're based on in-jokes from a podcast I love: The Greatest Generation. (A Star Trek podcast by two guys who are a little embarrassed to have a Star Trek podcast.)

But sometimes I have to make stuff just for myself, or just to see if I can, or even just because I have an idea in my head that will keep percolating until I exorcize it appropriately. 

Thus: A 6-part ornament series...based on jokes that no one but me and a very niche audience will get. 

Worf's Loaves, Kevin Uxbridge's Real Dolls, a Natural Yeager, and the potted-plant-ness of the two lead female characters on Star Trek: The Next Generation (Deanna Troi and Beverly Crusher). 

Wesley Crusher also gets an ornament, featuring his coogi-style sweaters.

And Yar's Scarves. The currency of the future? Scarves. 

Well, they made me a little bit happy, and other fans seemed to like them. So I guess it wasn't a complete waste of time.

Sally Yates: "I said no."

Timeliness can be problematic. After Sally Yates eviscerated Ted Cruz and John Cornyn I had a friend pipe up: Hey, you should do a Sally Yates thing!

Which...yeah. I totally should. And fast. Because I doing these current event felt objects means that time is of the essence. 

So I designed and made a Sally Yates ornament:

With mistakes. 

First off, Sally doesn't really have many pithy (short) quotes to use. 

Secondly, it's really hard to accurately capture that head-looking-up regal pose without someone looking just plain crooked. So much of that chin definition in that pose relies on the natural shadows and 3D-ness of the human body. It's very difficult to subtly render anything in felt, and it requires subtlety. 

Because of this, the lettering looks crooked. Which bugs me a TON. 

I also got the layering on the pink shirt wrong. I guess I haven't done one of these in a while (I've been working on a Firefly Busy Book and some stitching samplers) and I'm out of practice. 

Oh well, you can't get them all right the first time. I might still use this example in a pattern, though, because I rarely love making the same thing twice. 

Off the Shop: So you've had a vasectomy!

A friend's husband had a vasectomy.

This occasion needed to be celebrated by something that I will likely never sell.

I realize it's not biologically accurate, but it does capture the spirit of things. :)

Off the Shop: A dubious commission.

I've detailed here how I decide who and what to make, and one of those criterion is that it has to fit with my personal philosophies in some way. I wouldn't ever make a Hitler ornament, for instance, because f*ck no.

So when a friend asked me if I was making a Donald Trump ornament, my response was an enthusiastic "absolutely not". When he asked me if I could make one for him, it was a similar response.

But he begged and begged with the absolute caveat that I could make it look like anything I wanted; it didn't have to be reverent (he was not a Trump supporter).

We looked through pictures together and settled on a design that he and I could both tolerate.

I still delayed. I created projects that were placed into the line before this one--every time I would think about doing it I would exclaim an audible "ugh".

But once I say I'll do a thing, I do it.

And here it is.

It's interesting. Because my heart wasn't into it, I didn't really do as quality a job as I would have wanted to . . . and I don't care. I would have re-done the eyes, for sure. And the mouth. (Stitched instead of felt.) Alas, I'm not spending another moment on it.

This is also not my original design. If I had intended to sell this or do anything more than quietly give it to my friend, I wouldn't have blatantly ripped off this street design and I would have put more effort into many elements.

The original "Dump Trump" on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Courtesy of Hanksy. Via Business Insider.

Ruth Bader Ginsberg: The Value of Trial and Error

The Ruth Bader Ginsberg "DISSENT" ornament was one of the first I made. I had a Notorious RBG maternity shirt, and when I wanted to see if I could do faces it was my first crack at it.

RBG--first attempt.

Not bad for a first crack at it. But then I made a bunch more ornaments and this one--though really popular--was bugging me a little bit. I had learned not to accidentally split a stitch on small details (you can see that her "lace" collar is pretty wonky in places), that thinner, stiffer felt works much better for lettering, and better techniques for doing eyes.

So I decided to give it another shot and got this:

RBG -- Second attempt.

Much better eyes. Thicker, denser face felt, more conscientious collar stitching. Incorporating my husband's feedback that the letters were a bit hard to read, I included the center stitch that I had been including on more recent ornaments.

Here's the before and after:

I think I'd make the center-stitch a light grey color, were I going to improve this a bit more.

Techniques: Eyes, Part 2

Tina's eyes are...not ideal. I mean, not her. Her felt representation.

As I mentioned in a previous post, eyes have been difficult for me. The best technique I came up with was to cut out an eye hole, carefully cut out an iris (which is hard, because it's tiny), glue the iris in, and then stuff little fluffy bits of spare white felt in to fill the whites of the eyes.

This technique tended to work better on brown or tan felt "skin" than on cream "skin".

It looks pretty good on Neil deGrasse Tyson, for instance. 

I decided to take a bit of a risk and try something different. Behold, the technique of stitching the top part of the eye and then making a french knot for the eye itself:

Wellstone!

Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony

What I get is a greater amount of eye precision (though French knots can be tricky if your thread decides to get weirdly bumpy or oddly shaped in your knot) without looking like it's too raised up from the page (causing a pop-eye).

This didn't really work when I stitched the lower part of the eye:

Bob Ross looks...kind of creepy this way.

I'm wondering if I should re-do my patterns with this instruction (or maybe just an alternate method description). It will likely, however, get too confusing. So I should just commit to one method or the other.

Idea-->Execution: Frida Kahlo

Sometimes my ideas don't turn out quite right and I can't figure out why. Take Frida Kahlo, for instance.

Some elements need to be way-simplified for felt, but as far as inspiration goes--you have a distinct look. This should, in theory, be an ornament that turns out well.

But it didn't.

The pattern I made looked okay. (Note: my patterns are a combination of freehand and tracing, depending on how I want to interpret a subject. Sometimes I do multiple images sort of mashed into a representation that I'm looking for--but this was meant to mimic a bit more.)

But somewhere in between the pattern and the execution...something just didn't translate.

It wasn't bad, per se, but there is something about it that is just...off. Which is very disheartening after spending quite a bit of time on that flower embroidery background.

I always have issues with eyes. Eyes are tough because they can go dead-eyed uncanny-valley very quickly. But this seemed more...hulking... than Frida. So I gave her a jaw shaving.

And it's kind of amazing the difference such a subtle change makes. I'm still getting a lot of shadow under the brows (because of the way the light falls), but it's a totally different looking Frida. And, perhaps, it's a less accurate Frida (the original picture has that very rounded off--nearly square-to-round jawline, this is slightly more heart-shaped).

Sometimes you have to exaggerate or suggest some features in this medium (like the lips are merely represented by stitch, otherwise everyone looks like they have pouty-duck-lips).

Before:

After:

I had similar problems getting things right with Hillary Clinton and Julia Child.
And let me tell you, it's gutsy to cut into an already-assembled project. One must have the courage of their convictions.

Off the Shop: Things I Can't/Won't Sell

Along with the normal round-up of semi-subversive ornaments, there are also several that I likely won't end up putting in my shop/sharing widely.

So they're going to go here.

I have a Happy Uterus Ornament as seen below:

Which is adorable. And a little bit subversive. My mother--the Scandinavian nurse--was amused and baffled, but not totally horrified.

But this one is NOT going into the shop.
(Putting it behind a jump because of mild-NSFW-ish-ness...I mean, it's a felt vulva.)

Making Betty White

Hi Betty White!
I got a few requests to make a process post showing how I make my ornaments/felt crafts. So I took pictures while making a new ornament: Betty White!

I'm going to walk through some of my techniques and tips and tricks and you'll also see some of my thought process/adjustments as I go along (this is my first time testing the pattern).

(Forgive the basement lighting--the color will be inconsistent, but you'll be able to see what I'm doing, generally.)

And because there are so many pictures...it's behind a cut!