Preliminary placing, Taped garden flagSewingFirst attempt at sewing down one of the sidesShould’ve done it this way insteadFreshly sewn garden flag!Fusing the test pigFused!Testing the fabric paint and several markers…because of the nature of the fabric, water-based anything will bleed
Ready for fusing! Make sure to iron it first!Peeling off the fuse backing after ironingTrimming excess fuse. The nylon shrunk when placed under heat.Dry placed, with fuse backing still attachedFusing!Final fused with test pig set for decision makingFirst paintPainting!
All done!!!!Flowers!Puffy marker colored, before heatOverheated puffy marker. It’s supposed to puff when introduced to heatPeeling off the overheated marker. I colored it back in afterwards
Tips:
I tried to use an X‑Acto knife, but it was not useful for me and frayed the fabric. Scissors were much easier. A rotary cutter/X‑Acto knife is perfect for making straight cuts (ie the flag itself).
Don’t forget that fuse web needs to be traced on backwards!
Take it easy with the sewing pedal, lol.
If I were to do it again, I’d have used red thread, instead of yellow because I’m only a beginner sewer. That way my lack of ability and impatience wouldn’t be so obvious.
Be careful when you’re painting, not to smear it everywhere
Do not overheat the puffy velvet marker if that’s what you’re using
Maybe try a real paintbrush for detail instead of my toothpick.
The nylon will shrink when ironed, so take that into consideration and I would definitely recommend ironing the blank flag before trying to fuse.
Patience! Steady hand! Reduce interruptions from people or dogs!
Several months ago in October or November (I can’t remember), I ordered from some shady Facebook-ad shopping site a tooth brushing device that claimed to work in a mere 15 seconds because it would do all 4 quads at once. In theory, it sounds good. At a hefty price tag that I now forget but that I remember being expensive, I went for it anyways for the sake of dental hygiene and my patients. Before I clicked Complete Order, I already knew this would be a flop. ALL FOR THE PATIENTS!!!
Fast-forward to mid-January and I receive in the mail along with my Lunar New Year cards and Hong Kong drama video series, this package that I’ve long forgotten about. It cracked me up.
Chinese on the side. I am not surprised in the least. Nowhere in the description nor the checkout process did it say anything about from what country of origin this would arrive. The only indication it would come from outside the country was in the tracking email I received in the days thereafter ordering.
Let’s try this bad boy out!
My first impression was, holy crap. Someone used this and then returned it and now they’re sending it to me.
Mysterious, dark spots, dents
Inexplicable material stuck to it
Welllllp. FOR THE PATIENTS AND DENTAL HYGIENE!
I quickly scanned the instructions. Liquid toothpaste? What’s that? I have never heard of it before, but you know what? Now I have. A quick Amazon search yielded 2, one of which was Kosher. Alrighty then. I’ll just jam my gel toothpaste into this tiny hole and mix with water to try and make a liquid toothpaste. In retrospect, I probably should have done that outside the receptacle. Then I contemplated throwing it all away because it really did look like someone had already used it before me. FOR THE PATIENTS AND DENTAL HYGIENE!
Put it all together, and hey let’s go! For my co-workers I made a video of me using it. Let it be known that in the course of the day, I’d drank tea with honey, ate yogurt, a strawberry shortcake, had nachos with lots of beans for dinner.…all things that would coat my teeth and give that fuzzy teeth feeling.
Results: What a waste of money. Granted I need to have liquid toothpaste in order to give it a true test, but seeing as how it works and the force of the vibration of the silicone bristle and the size of the mouthpiece and the lack of size and coverage of the silicone bristles, there is no way this thing could clean your teeth well, even with the help of liquid toothpaste. I knew it from the beginning (who wouldn’t know it besides the very hopeful dentally lazy people), but I still went for it because PATIENTS AND DENTAL HYGIENE. My teeth felt as fuzzy as it did before. I’ll give it a slightly less fuzzy feel, but there’s no way it would ever have given a good clean, liquid toothpaste or not.
Cons: The mouthpiece was very large, it was a good thing I have a big mouth. There was the question of how sanitary it was. How would you possibly clean the toothpaste reservoir? Need for liquid toothpaste. Lack of coverage of teeth with the silicone bristles. The bulb would easily fall off the mouthpiece. Very long shipping time (at least 3 months).
Pros: It really was a 15-second timer, so yes, the product did what it described it would do. The metal-less charging plate was interesting although I didn’t try it out. You simply place the pieces on the flat plate and plug it into a USB port.
Man, I could’ve spent that money on something more useful. Back to the 2‑minute electric and manual tooth brushing, kids.
