#the internet has made it a lot easier to learn about things

[ahoyimlosingmymind]

is Adhd/autism really becoming a trend or are the neurodivergent folk just finding each other, falling in love, because they feel seen by one another, and having kids?

is adhd/autism really becoming a trend or is the internet just the place we feel the most heard and like we can speak up without the stress of having 'perfect' neurotypical 'social interaction'? is it a trend, or has social media just created easier avenues for connection for us? Is it becoming a trend, or are we just a big chunk of the content creators online? bc ya know... the 9-5 workforce doesn't jive with a lot of us, and we're all striving to be seen and understood.

Is it a trend, or is this the place where we found out other people were like us?

idk. just thinkin thoughts my dudes

[vsa-pieldepapel]

ralsusie became real and kinda popular in the fandom and i IMMEDIATELY thought of you. also your susie hadcanons... you're predicting it all....

so what are your thoughts on their dynamic in the new chapter? and on susie's character development overall?

oh it's a fucking party in my house rn you have no idea. i have so many things to say about them that i don't believe its possible to make all of them coherent in a single post but i'll vomit some of it Before that tho i must say i am surprised at how many people thought of me w these new developmetns lol. mostly because the internet is so fast paced i thought no one would remember. thank you though.

i remember saying somewhere that I was convinced ralsei observing susie's independence and force of will would plant a seed in his head for him to strive for freedom and agency, and I'm surprised how dead on that was. Guts is widely accepted to be the stat for how much a character is willing to stand against the control of the player, which ralsei has Zero of in all chapters, but fascinatingly, even though he goes back to zero in ch4, at the tail end of ch3 before i fought the roaring knight i checked the power screen and ralsei had a single Guts point. this was immediately after susie consoled Tenna and told him, "did you hear that, Ralsei?" so i am convinced that single moment of guts was brought forth by her, by the lessons he learns from her character.

I had rather low expectations going into the new chapters because I really still wasnt convinced if Toby was self aware on how he was writing the holiday family, susie and noelle, and ralsusie, or if that was all serendipitous. The new chapters make me believe more strongly that he is aware and its not all coincidental. theres a lot here and i would have to make an entire separate post about it but I was incredibly pleasantly surprised by how many poignant, emotionally resonant moments happened between susie and ralsei building on how much they push each other to be better, and how it's emphasised that they're influencing the other. I was incredibly shocked in a good way that they had an actual argument, but Susie didn't resort to all the coping mechanisms we see her use with Lancer. Ralsei has proven now that he will be there by her side and she has decided to believe in that rather than keeping in mind that she could be abandoned at any turn, and I thought them being able to genuinely talk it out and MAKE it through an argument was an excellent indicator of how powerful their relationship is (and I do mean this all even if it's just friendship stuff for now, because the healthiest couples, anyway, are those where your partner is also your friend). I remember being skeptical way back when of people who made susie sporty and confident, because she struck me as feeling ugly, insecure, and not really that successful in that regard either, and I'm glad I was right. Her monologues about feeling unwanted and broken which feels very much the result of unstable circumstances like moving constantly, where there is no consistency to any one situation, and neglectful or abusive parenting were very resonant. Curiously though my fave part of all these new developments about susie are when it pertains to how she connects to the lore of the prophecy, which is another separate post. Basically, I love how susie is a "wild card", but that necessitates a LOT of elaboration. I like that her stubbornness and her will to fight are displayed for both when they're good and worth it and when they're dysfunctional. I also found the exploration of how an individuals psyche shapes a dark world fascinating.

The bloody handprint lives fucking rent free in my head. Again, I need to make a MASSIVE post to connect a lot of dots here idk how to do it. But I am very, very excited. Maybe it would be easier to organise everything if I was prompted to talk about specific things. I could make a pepe silvia style video about it atp rofl

[luceafarul-de-dimineata]

I think Whb is a very autistic experience, even more than other fandoms. Let me explain.

1. They speak very ackwardly

One of the first things you’ll notice while playing whb is that it is very weirdly translated. It’s like they took the koreean text, put it into google translate and didn’t have anyone edit it. Words are not placed in the correct order, stuff is repeated constantly, everyone (especially the MC) don’t seem to grasp how normal human speech is supposed to sound. What did it for me the first time was the “he scolds me with words” which was so bad it made me take a break from the game.

But it’s voiceacted.

Someone other than the writer (I refuse to believe there’s more than one) had to see the text and read it out loud. Yeah, its in Koreean and maybe the koreean text is better, but still. When you see badly written stuff on the internet, you just assume that said person doesn’t know English, but when it’s voiceacted it wierdly feels like the text is correct or that the error is somehow intentional.

As someone with both dislexia and autism, the way whb is writen makes me feel very seen. Those weird sentences, the internal monolog that does more to confuse than to elucidate are how it feels like to read my writing. I don’t really know how speaking works and putting it in writing adds another challenge to the already difficult task. I trully believe that if only they had one editor to come and look over their stuff it would be more coherent, but it would lose the particular charm I grew fond of…

2. The MC is very clearly autistic

I’m not exactly a conosur (7 years of french and this is still my level) of Preetybusy ips, but I did play a bit of every game they released and I can say that MC being autistic just seems to be a thing they always add.

I think the writer at preetybusy is autistic because I don’t know how else to explain some of these things.

As stated before, Mc in particular gets some of the strangests lines, especially during the nsfw scenes. Does that mean that they have a speech impediment? I sure hope so. The thing is that even when the writing is ackward it still somehow feels like something MC would think.

Secondly, MC is extremely picky with who they talk to and actually engage with. We see that they like Minhyeok because he’s basicly their caretaker, but Minhyeok says that he takes MC out to hang out with other people and they always stay close to him and only him. MC seems incapable of making the type of small talk that is expected at meetings like this… almost like they’re autistic and have a funky way of expressing themselves, leading to people being offput by them. Just saying.

Thirdly, Mc has a special interest in sex. They don’t just watch porn to get off, even when the devils come out with some more niche kinks, MC is just like: “Oh, I know that one” and plays along. I don’t care how kinky you are, there’s no way you would have intimate knowledge on so many fetishes if porn didn’t do a little more than arouse you.

Fourthly, MC is weird. Just fucking deranged, I grow to love them more with every word I type out. We know very little about MC because everytime we learn something new people throw a tantrum over it, but the little with know is just so fucking tragic and funny at the same time. MC is someone that has some out of the box interests and due to that and their speech problems they get isolated and the only time they feel at home is when they get kidnapped to hell where every single character is autistic.

There’s this small scene in I think Levi’s selfie story, where MC is bracing themselves for a social interaction and being anxious about saying or doing something weird and ruining the whole event and it pierced right into my soul. Mc has autism

3. The devils have autism

This one is a lot easier. Usually when writers want to make a species that isn’t quite human they just write someone with autism. Robots, fairies, dragons, ghost, if its not human, then it’s autistic.

The demons have no concept of personal space or boundaries, they have the same weird speech patterns, they’re kink is half their personality, they have two people that they’ll do anything and everything for, they can’t lie, most can’t read social cues, they’re autistic.

And that’s why they fit in with the MC so well. Because as an autistic person, you start realising that in order to get that emotional fullfilment you desire you must stick to other’s that are like you. Not to bring Luceafarul into this, but in order to get that strong meaningful relationship where you both love eachother more than anything else on earth, the love where you feel like being away from that person is a crushing weigh, the love that makes you wish you would sacriface everything just for an hour of spending time with them… you have to do it with another autistic person. You won’t get that from neurotypicals because a relationship means something else to them. They prefere the aesthetics and you have to play this 4d chess with them in order to realise what they want and if you read it incorrectly then you risk that person breaking up with you for seemingly no reason. For them a relationship is simultaniasly mendatory but also something you’re supposed to only enjoy for a little while.

This is a psa to date autistic

In conclusion, I think that whb is autistic and that’s partly why I always find myself coming back to it.

[undomesticated-animal]

Honestly, body euphoria has done WONDERS for my ability to keep a physical self care routine, and I keep thinking back to Young Domi being so fucking OVERWHELMED by the thought of having to haul myself through the daily gauntlet of mirrors, lights, smells, self-shaming, and dysphoria inducing body modifictions made in a desperate bid to feel worthy of my skin. The idea that this could ever be anything but NEUTRAL AT BEST was laughable to me, so much so that I didn't even realize how terrified I felt by the possibility it could be real.

I can't go back and tell Past Domi all the things I understand now that I know would have mattered so much, but I can say them on the internet and maybe someone gets to learn them faster than I did.

Body euphoria isn't just for trans and intersex folks. And I mean this more than just "oh cis people should get gender ephoria too" (it's true!) because I also mean that the idea that body euphoria/dysphoria is neatly segmented up into little slices of life with no crossover is unrealistic and painful for everyone. Thinking that I was only allowed to care about my euphoria around gender actually made it REALLY hard to recognize I was having DYSphoria around my gender at all. After all, I avoided thinking about that in exactly the same ways I avoided thinking about the dysphoria around other aspects of my embodiment! I must just be bad at body positivity, "it's always easier to do for others than for myself 🤗 teehee" was a go to blow off for me when people asked me to confront how visibly uncomfortable I was in my body.

Because the thing is, it ISN'T easier to do for others than yourself. It really isn't. The part that's easier is avoiding the shame we feel about it. But once we confront the shame, loving your body is the easiest thing in the world. <- this is gonna be where Past Domi went "oh fuck this noise" and bounced but HEAR ME OUT

A body you cannot live with is a body you cannot care for, and a body you can't care for is a body you will almost always struggle to live with. This feedback loop is the CORNERSTONE of body dysphoria for a lot of people. It's a chicken and egg situation where it's nearly always going to be impossible to know what came first, but once either is present, the other will kick into gear to really hunker down in your psyche.

The feedback loop works the other direction too though. This is why people tell you to find the little things that make a tiny difference. They are (usually) not telling you that it'll be enough on its own, but every one of those you find uncovers new ones, and little by little you start feeling up to bigger pieces of self care because you've recovered enough to start putting int the front-loaded work for the worthwhile outcome

When that upwards feedback loop clicks? It's night and day. Like I genuinely don't know how to describe what it's like to just sort of.....wake up different. But it happens all the time, and it KEEPS happening. And you start to realize you're not "waking up different" you're just....getting to know yourself without feeling so uncomfortable with what you're learning that you shy away from yourself

I dunno man, I don't have a point here, but I've been processing old grief lately and the grief of how long I spent viciously hating myself and truly believing that's what neutrality feels like.....Little-Domi deserved better, and so do yall

[marzipanandminutiae]

Hello!

I am an aspiring author who struggles with accurately portraying historical clothing, and I stumbled across your blog while searching for photographs and information on late 19th century/USA Gilded Age fashion. From the research I've seen compiled across books/the internet, the clothing of the upper class from that area is very well documented in paintings, garment catalogues, photographs, museums, etc....but finding information on what the day-to-day wear of normal people was like is proving much more difficult. Since you seem to be knowledgeable in the subject of historical clothing in this approximate time period, I was wondering if you knew about any good resources to learn more about what people who couldn't afford to follow upper class trends were wearing in the general era as well as any general information around these items.

If it helps, I'm focused on eastern and southeastern United States farming/small railroad town/mountain mining/gulf coast wetland communities, but even just more general resources about what sort of clothing that the average poor person during the Gilded Age wore would be greatly helpful. I've been able to find a few photographs here and there, but these probably aren't an accurate depiction of a persons' 'day-to-day' wear, and I also haven't found much on how women learned to sew homemade clothes, what garments if any would have been bought, where people in rural areas would have sourced their cloth, what undergarments were like, how work shoes were made & aquired, ect.

Please feel free to ignore this if it isn't something you're interested in answering as I'm sure you get a lot of asks, but I'd greatly appreciate it if you have any pointers!

So here's the thing about 19th-century clothing:

in many ways, it's the same all the way down

now, that's a serious generalization. is a farm wife in Colorado going to be wearing the same thing as a Vanderbilt re: materials, fit, and up-to-the-minute trendiness? obviously not. but because so much of what people wore back then has only survived to the present day in our formalwear- long skirts, suits, etc. -we tend to have difficulty recognizing ordinary or "casual" clothing from that period. I also sometimes call this Ballgownification, from the tendency to label literally every pretty Victorian dress a Ball Gown (even on museum websites, at times). Even work clothing can consist of things you wouldn't expect to be work clothing- yes, they sometimes worked in skirts that are long by modern standards, or starched shirts and suspenders. Occupational "crap job clothes" existed, but sometimes we can't recognize even that because of modern conventions.

A wealthy lady wore a lot of two-piece dresses. Her maid wore a lot of two-piece dresses. The trailblazing lady doctor working at the hospital down the road from her house wore a lot of two-piece dresses. The factory worker who made the machine lace the maid used to trim her church dress wore a lot of two-piece dresses. The teenage daughter of the farm family that raised the cows that supplied the city where all those people lived wore a lot of- you get the idea. The FORMAT was very similar across most of American and British society; the variations tended to come in fabrics, trims, fit precision, and how frequently styles would be updated.

Having fewer outfits would be common the further down the social ladder you went, but people still tried to have as much underwear as possible- undergarments wicked up sweat and having clean ones every day was considered crucial for cleanliness. You also would see things changing more slowly- not at a snail's pace, but it might end up being a few years behind the sort of thing you'd see at Newport in the summer, so to speak. Underwear was easier to make oneself than precisely cut and fitted outer garments for adults (usually professionally made for all but the poorest of the poor for a long time- dressmakers and tailors catering to working-class clientele did exist), but that also began to be mass-produced sooner than outer clothing. So depending on the specific location, social status, and era, you might see that sort of thing and children's clothing homemade more often than anything else. Around the 1890s it became more common to purchase dresses and suits ready-made from catalogues like Sears-Roebuck, in the States, though it still hadn't outpaced professional tailoring and dressmaking yet. Work shoes came from dedicated cobblers, and even if you lived in isolated areas, VERY few people in the US and UK wove their own fabric. Most got it from the nearest store on trips to town, or took apart older garments they already had to hand and reused the cloth for that.

I guess the biggest thing I want to emphasize is that, to modern eyes, it can be very hard to tell who is rich and who is anywhere from upper-working-class to middling in Gilded Age photographs. Because just like nowadays a custodial worker and Kim Kardashian might both wear jeans and a t-shirt, the outfit format was the same for much of society.

Candid photography can be great for this sort of thing:

Flower-sellers in London's Covent Garden, 1877. Note that the hat on the far right woman is only a few years out-of-date; she may have gotten it new at the time or from a secondhand clothing market, which were quite popular on both sides of the Atlantic.

Also London, turn of the 20th century.

A family in Denver, Colorado, c. early 1890s.

Train passengers, Atlanta, Georgia, probably 1890s.

Hope this helps!

[a-student-out-of-time]

More Real Talk

Hey everyone. Mod Bubbles here.

I'm not gonna beat around the bush here: you all know what's going on, you've all heard about it, you don't need me to tell you about it. You've heard about it and you're gonna hear about it a lot these next four years.

I don't want to talk about that. Instead, I wanna address something else that, on a personal level, I believe is a lot more serious but a lot easier to grapple with.

You wanna know what I believe is the biggest problem we're dealing with these days? You can point to a lot of things, but at the core, they all have the same root to them.

Hopelessness.

Yeah, a DR blog talking about hope, how crazy is that?

But in all seriousness, it's at the core of every argument, every political discussion, every post I see made about not just the near future, but the long term as well. It's always the same points about neo-fascism, climate change, wars, cyberpunk dystopias, and global extinction. Very few people today seem to have any faith that the world can be better.

And I can't say I blame them. I was there too once, when I was a teenager. I lived in constant fear of the future, worried about what it means for me, and I'd get trapped in doomscrolling cycles. I'd lay awake at night and cry my eyes out. Yet I'm still here, on the cusp of turning 30, and I'm at a better point in my life than I've ever been.

Fear and desperation are ultimately useful, but they can be self-destructive. They can prevent you from seeing the truth and make you ironically vulnerable to the ones you should be most afraid of.

Why do people join cults or militias or vote for bad politicians? Are they all just stupid or evil? Sure, some may be, but most are just desperate, afraid and don't understand how the world really works. They need a helping hand with deprogramming what they were told.

Here's the facts:

We've already beaten climate change's worst predictions and the changes we've made can be reversed.

Plastic pollution in the oceans is being cleaned up.

Conservation success stories just keep coming.

More people are living better lives nowadays, with lower rates of child morality, starvation, crime, preventable diseases, even bullying rates have declined.

The Green Energy Revolution is here and nothing is going to stop it.

New advancements in materials science are on the way and will revolutionize everything from construction to manufacturing to space exploration.

I say all this because the ultimate source of hope is knowledge. Yes, you can open yourself up to a lot of dark avenues when you start learning about the world, but you'll also learn how much good there is out there being done.

This isn't a distraction, it's how I help people understand that the world can always be better and that just one person being in power will not change that.

Now, I know what you may say to that. I've seen posts about how the internet is going to be censored, that propaganda spread everywhere, that there'll be concentration camps, the constitution will be ripped up, etc.

And to that, I have to be honest: I've already heard it all before.

The things you're worried about today? I was worried about them in 2009 during the Great Recession. People worried about them in 2005 when Bush was re-elected, and the concerns there also included terrorism. Do we even still talk about Al-Qaeda? Not really!

And misinformation in this age has always been a problem, especially on the big sites. These are old problems brought to the forefront, and it's always been important to learn the skills to spot them.

More importantly, all this assumes the administration would actually be able to implement any of their promises. Every administration does that and few of the truly big ones about change have happened, especially because said promises ran counter to reality within the system.

I'm not trying to downplay any concerns about the situation, I promise. It's okay to be sad, scared, and concerned about peoples' safety. It's okay to cry if you need to. What you should not do is give up just because of all this.

I'm going to sound very harsh for a moment, but I need to say it: by being doomerist and defeatist, you're part of the problem. You not only stop helping, you run the risk of discouraging other people from trying because you believe it's pointless. When you succumb to pessimistic nihilism, you create a self-fulfilling prophecy that only rewards those who benefit from your inaction or your death.

Don't do that to people. Don't do that to yourself.

The world gets better when you first believe it can be better. How do you do that?

Well, I can't speak for everyone, but here's some suggestions that I'm sticking to:

Live daily life. Get up, eat, stay hydrated, take your medication, bathe, dress comfortably, listen to music, watch a movie, clean your home, play a game, hang out with friends, just do things that make you happy. As you should always do.

Stop looking at doomer posts. It literally does not help with anything and they are not credible sources of information just because they're cynical.

Do not let go of your ambitions. Always have a dream or a goal in mind, no matter what it is, and always aim for it. It's never stupid, it's never too late, it's something you aspire to and that's really awesome.

Stop looking for enemies. There are more important things to devote your time to than arguing over inane bullshit on the internet. That's been true since the start.

Be kind to people. Let go of whatever anger and resentment you may have for people, try to make new friends, and recognize when you can help someone else in need. Sometimes it's as simple as letting them know you care.

Be kind to yourself. You are not a failure, you're not a burden, you're not a lost cause, you can always improve as long as you're alive.

Remove toxicity from your life. Cut out bad influences and replace them with better things. If you have to leave a toxic environment, you can work on doing so.

Always learn new things. It's really fun to end the day with a new piece of knowledge you didn't have the day before.

Let yourself feel. Are you angry? Sad? Scared? Worried? Let yourself feel it, and then you can move on. Don't bury an emotion or let it stagnate.

Learn to recognize bad faith posts/misinformation. This is a critical skill to possess and one you need to always pass on to others. Not everyone who posts it is evil, sometimes all they need is a simple correction on a matter and the situation will be resolved.

Clown on Evil. Whenever people want you to fear them or take them seriously, you mock them, make memes about them, treat them as a joke and defuse whatever power they try to have.

Be true to yourself. Above all, don't let the next 4 years turn you into something you're not.

I say all this as someone who's been around longer than a lot of people who follow me: your future is not empty. I wished I'd done years ago everything I'm doing now, but I've decided I'd rather do them than spend the rest of my life lamenting and wondering what might've been.

You can spend years convincing yourself there is no future, and then the future arrives and you have no idea what to do anymore.

Change- actual change- starts from below and works its way up. And no matter how much life beats you down, no matter what's on TV or what the future may hold, you can always choose to do something about it.

You can always choose to be kind to yourself and to others. You can always choose to believe. And that's where you can start.

[aces-and-angels]

ART CAMPAIGN BOOST SUBMISSIONS:

edit: i hit the image limit for this post, so any new additions will be included here

the tag is starting to get kinda crowded (great problem, dw). i just thought compiling them all here would make things easier for everyone to find! all of the art displayed below is free to use for the purposes of promoting vetted gfm's here on tumblr. no credit is needed unless specified (marked = ***). if you have any questions regarding how to craft a post using any of the art provided -> please do not hesitate to reach out to me! note: please press follow post as i will most likely need to update this masterlist from time to time.

some info is below the cut on how to best utilize this material. please read it in its entirety before using any artwork. thank you 🖤

learn how to make art for this project here:

---

this project has gained a lot of momentum and has shown very promising results. the level of engagement once art is attached to a vetted gfm increases significantly. you will see what i mean as i have linked example posts of how to best use these pieces to help families in need.

i currently have a list of over 20+ families that i am spotlighting in my own personal progress tracker (the list has gotten so long that i now need to make a second version to accommodate all the families trying to get in contact with me).

this art campaign boost is truly meant to be utilized by anyone. i would sincerely appreciate it if y'all could take some time and pick maybe 1-2 people from this list and use the art below to create your own signal boost posts on the families' behalf. as someone who is periodically tracking their progress- i know that donation rates have slowed for a number of them. i am one person and can only do so much on my own. the essence of this initiative is to get more people to mobilize as a collective. it will take everyone to get on board in order for these families to be able to reach their goals. that means spotlighting their accounts/campaigns periodically.

you need to keep up the momentum.

the individuals you are helping currently live in areas with minimal internet connection, meaning it is very difficult to spotlight themselves on their own. especially since this site is continuously suppressing/deleting their accounts. they need you to interact with their content. tumblr isn't like other social media sites. it's known for being very 'anti-algorithm' and it's common culture for many of us to not really care about our levels of engagement (i.e. follower count/amount of notes per post). it's very hard for your own content to "break" your inner circle of followers and gain traction if the topic of the post is not "popular" or "trending" these families are not operating on this site the same way you are. you may be using this platform as a means to "just vibe" but they are using it as a desperate attempt to raise essential funding to save their lives. the importance that their posts be elevated cannot be overstated. anyone who has ever created any sort of og content here knows how quickly a post can die out if no one interacts with it. this cannot happen with them.

tips for making your own signal boost post* (*for vetted campaigns):

-> make it easy to read + eye-catching: the problem i am seeing when you search many of these families' accounts is that their "tag" (username of their account) is full of the same types of posts (i.e. a generic response to their initial message to another person on tumblr) <- aka it is very easy for people to tune out which is the opposite of what we want to happen. creating your OWN posts in response to their asks allows the art to appear FIRST when people look up someone's account via tumblr's search bar, which will attract more attention to their accounts. it also forces people who are making these posts to actually sit down and read the stories they are sharing with the rest of their mutuals/lurkers alike -> include verification sources: the main reason people are searching for these accounts is b/c they are trying to see if it is okay to reblog/share their campaign with their own following. if you address this plainly and early on in your post that includes artwork -> people are more likely to interact -> tag the account you are promoting: please include the families' account as one of your #'s so it will appear when you search for their names on tumblr. also try @'ing their account in your post so it'll be easier for these families to find your work. some of them are incredibly new to the platform and may not be aware of all its features. something that you may find intuitive may not be as easily understood for these individuals. your role is to make them as easy as possible to find for others so they can gain more support. --- don't have time to type out a whole post for a family on their behalf? -> interact with one of theirs! attach something nice/helpful to their posts so it is more readily available for others to share. the same rules apply from above. as i said before, some of these accounts are brand spanking new and are not formatted in the same ways as others that may be more well-versed on how tumblr operates in terms of promoting their campaigns. (for example: even if the account has been vetted/verified by multiple trusted individuals- the owners of that account may not know to include that info in their posts about their campaign every single time they post. you can make their lives easier by including that info for them by reblogging one of their og posts and adding the necessary info on their behalf)

you can also find a more comprehensive list of vetted campaigns by el-shab-hussein/nabulsi here <- their list is now over 200+ with several campaigns that are "in the red" (very low in funding). please do not hesitate to try to spotlight anyone from this list as well!

el-shab-hussein also has a masterpost pinned here with additional campaigns (including those for other countries like sudan)

alright i've explained enough- time for the art!

artist: @rhq274 | @rhq2744 *** free to use, credit required meet raghad (read and share full post here) Hello, I am Raghad Qanou, a medical student from Gaza City. My people and I have been subjected to genocide for more than 230 days. My family and I have lived through various types of torture and inhumane conditions. This link is my only chance for me and my family to escape death and try to start over. This is not easy. But we are trying, and we would be happy to have you help save our lives and our future. instructions to utilize artwork: those who wish to share raghad's art MUST do ALL of the following: -> follow raghad on tumblr @rhq274 | @rhq2744 -> like + reblog one or more of her posts seen on her account that promotes her fundraiser (you may also include additional art shown below to help further boost her campaign; see example) once those actions detailed above are completed, you may use raghad's art to promote her campaign. *if you are utilizing this art for another campaign that is not raghad's -> you must also mention + link her fundraiser as well /// for those able: please consider donating to raghad's campaign here (vetted; no 221 on el-shab-hussein/nabulsi's sheet)

artist: me lol free to use, no credit required example

artist: @lampyri free to use, no credit required example

artist: @aria-ashryver free to use, no credit required example

artist: @monmonp0k free to use, credit not required- but if given, is appreciated example

artist: @juudaimes-true-form free to use, no credit required example

artist: @gaiuskamilah free to use, no credit required example

artist: @marnota free to use on all social media platforms (i.e. tumblr, insta, twitter, etc), no credit required example

artist: @marquainequeen free to use, no credit required example

artist: @palms-upturned free to use, no credit required example

artisit: @inkyswampbones free to use, no credit required example

[creativity-deficient]

Random Tweek Tweak hcs bc im thinking bout him yet again :)))

-Has an undiagnosed anxiety disorder, made worse by the increased use of Methamphetamine over the years and mistaken for adhd (canon/implied canon), which I do like to think DOES have as well. He is also on the autism spectrum.

-Has mild Seborrheic dermatitis, a skin condition that causes red and flaky patches of skin and usually flares up due to stress. It starts mainly on his head/under his hair as a kid but worsens in his teens years. Also has dermatillomania (a skin picking disorder), as well. Both of these become a lot worse in his teen years, with the addition of meth induced skin sores and hormonal acne to boot, but do become a lot more manageable for him as an adult. Still however, he does have some faint scars from all the picking and scratching over the years.

-Small tubby lil guy :) (sorta?? implied canon??), below average in height and considerably pudgy compared to most of his peers (genetics/stress eating). Loses a lot of this weight in his teen years due to health issues, but does gain a lot of it back as an adult. Also has a pudgy baby face that he never quite grows out of, even as an adult.

-His eyes a blue hazel, a rare eye color

-Sometimes snaps and hums to calm himself down.

-Enjoys baking as a casual hobby, though he’s still an amateur and doesn’t know how to make much. (implied canon)

-Once joined every school club because he had an anxiety attack and couldn’t decide what to pick

-Habitual nail chewer, again something he usually does due to stress. Nails are very short and stubby because of this

-Bandages on his fingers due to burns, skin picking, and nail biting

-Chronic ice-chewer

-Never learns to tie his shoes. Kept tripping over his laces before finally taking them out. Untied laces to laceless shoes to crocs to socks with sandals to velcro shoes pipeline

-Also never learns to drive, too much stress. Forever in his passenger princess era ✨

-Lowkey a backseat driver, though not in a “know it all” type of way. He mostly just freaks out the entire time.

-Can not sleep in the car because he’s afraid the second he closes his eyes, they’ll crash.

-Doesn’t know much slang/internet lingo and has absolutely no idea what his peers are talking about half the time (pretends he does and usually just ends up looking stupid 😔)

-Has a fear of rubberhose cartoons, as well as those weird old stop motion Christmas movies (he just finds them unsettling)

-Told about the secret family recipe as a teenager by his father, and is reasonably freaked out about it. Is forced to keep his mouth shut about it and suffers through major withdrawals before his parents are eventually exposed and arrested for the distribution of meth/counts of child abuse. Spends most of his high school years in therapy and rehab, though it’s all made easier with Craig by his side

-He and Craig try breaking up their freshman year of high school, both of them feeling like they need to try new things for a bit. It lasts about a week before they get back together.

-TERRIFIED of scissors and refuses to let anyone come near him with them. Grows his hair out long as a teenager before finally caving in and shaving it off as a young adult. He now keeps it managed, but Craig is the only person he trusts to do so.

-Did once try to cut his own hair in middle school though, and he spent weeks looking like a train-wreck before finally letting his mom fix it.

-His relationship with his mom is considerably better than his relationship with his father, and though he never quite forgives her for what she’s done, the two of them are able to reach some sort of closure with each other in Tweek’s older age

[fanofthings20]

Favorite Meal Prep

Agatha Harkness x reader (romantic fluff)

Anonymous asked: Heeey! I was wondering if you could write one Agatha Harkness x Reader (romantic relationship) Reader learns to cook Agatha’s favorite meal Fluff <3

You were up before Agatha. You had always been an early riser, so it wasn't surprising to her when she woke up to your side of the empty bed and the smell of coffee brewing. Before she met you, her meals normally consisted of magicking them because it was easier than manually doing it, given her habit of being on the run. You weren’t the most skilled in the kitchen mind you given your past experiences of accidental arson calls. But you could manage the basic quick and easy meals without a fire extinguisher needed on the counter by the stove.

You were busy fixing scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast when she entered the kitchen stopping to leaning against the doorway. Over the last two years, your ability to keep your focus on cooking has improved so there is less risk of any more close calls. But there are still times when she thinks back to the start of this relationship when she could distract you.

It was the first night you had stayed over at her place, you were up before her intending to fix her breakfast before she had to leave for work. She took a shower before going downstairs to join you and purposefully forgot to put anything on under and left the robe untied. She enjoyed getting you flustered and mesmerized. It had been about two months of officially dating when she did this to you. After the one-month mark, she came clean and told you about everything, that she was a witch, had lived through 350 years, her last relationship that had been over for a century, and finally about her son that she had lost.

It took you a little bit of time to fully comprehend how long she had been around for but nothing else phased you. Because you loved her so much that if she had told you she was a felon you still would pick her. It never failed to make her smile and chuckle to this day even two years later when she remembers how flustered you became when you turned around and witnessed her lack of clothing. It still catches her off guard with how much love and admiration you held in your eyes when you saw her then and in the present.

Nicky’s birthday was coming up in about two days. It was always a rough day for her given she was remembering all the good times with him while also mourning his loss. She typically stays in the house all day staring at the room she dedicated to him. You were always super supportive of her around that time even though you couldn’t understand what she was fully going through. Normally you would drop off enough food to get her through the day and stare at your phone to see if she texted or called needing you.

But this year she made it clear to you that she wanted you to stay in the house with her this year. This gave you the idea that you could try to make her favorite meal that she has mentioned those select times she could talk about the happy moments with Nicky. It took an awful lot of research in the local library and some rabbit hole searches on the internet to find as semi-close to the original recipes that she would have used back then to make their favorite meal.

It definitely would have been easier to ask Agatha for a quicker reference in the recipe but there were no possible questions that wouldn’t raise her suspicions and ruin the wholesome surprise.

You had been pulling about two weeks of late nights trying to perfect this surprise for her. On some nights you would use the excuse of having to work late after dinner since you worked from home so you could get back to your kitchen. Other nights you would be staying at her place you would go to bed with her and stay till you were sure she was asleep then sneak out to look on your laptop for recipes and tips.

The last thing you wanted to do was under or over-cook this meal and risk getting her sick. It had taken most of your paycheck, a lot of error trials, and burns on your arms. But two nights before you were going to make it for her you finally felt comfortable in your ability to follow the recipe and that it tasted fully cooked to you which wasn’t saying much since you never had it before.

Agatha’s favorite meal consisted of Thirded Bread, Cod Chowder, Boston Baked Beans, and Red Flannel Hash. Sadly Agatha was called away to help Teen with some magic lesson but it gave you plenty of time to fully prep the meal since it would take a few hours to make each piece. It was always entertaining to see Agatha grumble and sass about Teen but you could tell she only did it because she cared for the kid. Before she left the house she pulled you in for a savory kiss promising she would be back when she could.

You weren’t a witch so everything was manual method. You had stashed all the necessary pots in your car and after waiting fifteen minutes to ensure she wouldn’t come back. It was time to unload the pots and dig the supplies out of Agatha’s fridge which she hardly ever looked in there so that was an easy feat. The meal prep started with the chowder and hash since they were the biggest items with longer cooking times than the bread and beans.

It took roughly six to eight hours of cooking for the food to be ready. Thankfully you managed to make it through cooking without cutting anything besides the food and only some minor burns on your wrist from mishandling one of the pots. It was almost sunset when you managed to have the table set up in the dining room. The kitchen was clean and the pots were stashed in your car. It wasn’t meant to be a romantic setting striving more for a nostalgic and comfy setting to provide what you hoped would be a family-originated meal.

Even though you had never met Nicky, you greatly respected him and what he provided for Agatha even after all these years so this felt like you were trying to bring him in a sense for her. If the bugs weren’t so bad you would have taken her out to the woods in picnic style. Since that couldn’t be done you had almost bought the entire town candle store’s stock and had the main entrance to the dining room covered in candlelight to provide the closest outdoor setting you could.

It was after dark when Teen dropped Agatha back at her house before going home. Agatha wouldn’t openly admit it but she loved the kid and he had grown on her so it was nice to be a mentor to him. She was ready to see you again she would never move on or replace her precious Nicky. But you offered her a safe, caring supportive relationship which is what she desperately needed tonight.

She never expected to see the house dark with a clear pathway light by candles when she opened the door, nor her favorite music lightly playing. She carefully took her jacket and shoes off before following the path into the dining room. It was filled with candle light and a full meal on the table. What really caught her eye was seeing you standing there in a suit/dress with purple roses in your hand.

It amazed her that you did all of this for her, it's not that you haven’t before but she never felt like she deserved such treatment. Before she could get closer you went on a little speech “I know what tomorrow means for you darlin, I thought tonight we could celebrate Nicholas with the classic favorite meal. If I could I’d trade places with him so you could have him back even if I could only manage to give you one night in a heartbeat so you could have the life you both overly deserve.”

Agatha had silent tears running down her face when she glanced at the table to see what the meal consisted of, she had never been the best with emotions. She rushed over to you careful not to squish the roses carefully grabbing your face and kissing you gently trying to show her overwhelming gratitude and love. She carefully stepped back when the need for air arose still gently rubbing her thumb over your cheeks.

You were giving her the full treatment tonight pulling out her chair, filling her plate, and pouring her favorite wine. You were nervous awaiting her reaction to the food. But Agatha loved the entire meal and for the first time since she lost Nicky, she had a great night and time celebrating him. She shared stories of their adventures and that he would probably have loved being around you.

After the meal and clean up was done. Agatha dragged you upstairs for a relaxing bath together before you both ended up in the bed for cuddles and swapping cute family fluff stories.

To the Anonymus requester: I hope you enjoy this, I gave it my best. If you don't like it feel free to tell me. I'm always open to criticism and will gladly rewrite it if wanted.

Thank you to @hannah-0730 & @breadisrawtoast for your takes on what Agatha’s favorite meal might be. I greatly appreciate both of you and your inspiration for finding the video.

The video link below is the meal preference that was chosen for this fic.

[angelshizuka]

Hey! I notice you talk a lot about the discourse in the hellaverse fandom and i really like your explanations so i wanted to ask for your opinion on something?

Do you also get frustrated by how many people act like viv is responsibly for every single shortcoming of the hellaverse? It’s like nothing can even be slightly flawed without it being her fault somehow.

People act like she’s the sole writer for both shows and that whenever there’s a flaw, it’s her fault. There are multiple writers but i have ONLY ever seen criticism on her. Weird

When people dislike the merch, it’s her fault, when there’s complications with shipping merch it’s her fault, when something weird happens with fans it’s her fault, etc etc.

Queer women cannot exist on the internet without scrutiny. And i know what people are gonna say, they’re gonna list out every weird thing she’s ever done in the past and then tell me how it’s actually okay to harass people involved in the hellaverse because of this.

Regarding her past actions, i mean i just dont really think about it when i watch either show? Im not a twitter user, never will be again, so i dont even see half of any new drama. I just really dont care. maybe she’s been unprofessional before i can admit that but people have gone a bit too far. Im not gonna anon this ask bc frankly i couldnt care less if someone wants to yell at me it’s not that serious ill just log off

I cannot stand the Viv hate, because literally all arguments I've seen against her all fall under either one of these three categories: 1. mistakes she's made in the past but has learned from, 2. painfully obviously fake "evidence" and 3. things she didn't even do/had no control over (because like you said she's not the only one working on these shows).

An example for one of the most recent dramas with the Valentine's merch, I've legit seen haters attack Viv for FANART of the merch, thinking it was official merch. Aka, they just keep proving over and over again how quickly they are to blindly believe anything as long as it supports their "agenda". And Viv also had to clarify she wanted Angel included, but didn't have the final say, yet Viv is the only one getting attacked for Angel being absent.

Like, obviously I don't expect everyone to like her as a person, because sometimes we just don't vibe with people even if you like their work (though, most Viv haters use hating her work as an excuse to personally hate her, too). But it's the arguments people use on "why" that make it impossible for me to take them seriously, because so much of it just comes down to (internalized) misogyny and queerphobia. On top of her being a queer women in a still mainly male dominated industry, so she's an "easier" target.

Honestly, her female and queer characters being "impure/imperfect" is literally part of why I love them so much, they're human (well, demons) first and women and/or queer second. That's usually how you write the best characters, because when you write the woman/queer part first, so many writers fall into the trap of making them "pure/perfect" and THAT is how you dehumanize us.

And, sorry not sorry, but I'd rather vibe with a creator who's openly pro-trans rights, pro-LGBTQ+ rights in general, pro-women rights, anti-Trump, ect. (she shares those kinda things basially daily on her Instagram stories) than listen to anything these haters cry about.

Speaking of the trans thing, it says a lot about these haters that they'd rather believe fake "evidence" of her being transphobic than the words directly from a trans person's mouth (Morgana, aka Sallie May) who's friends with Viv and has to constantrly keep reminding people how supportive she is of trans rights.

[not-a-biscuit]

Hi, I’m trying to put together a compendium of information and tips from disabled people on how the world can be made more accessible to you. This includes any and all disabilities, whether they be physical or mental. If you consider yourself to be disabled, your input is appreciated.

If you’re not disabled, but would like to help get more information, it would be highly appreciated if you could re-blog, and if you wanted to tag some disabled friends that would be great, too. Even better actually!

(under the cut: further elaboration on what this would include, some sample questions, and the questionnaire and info sheet)

I’ve seen lots of posts from disabled people on small things that would be helpful for them (for example: not putting lots of emojis for people who use screen readers) and would just like to compile all of it in one easy to share document.

I would also love for it to include a resources section for learning more about different disabilities. Things like books, movies, videos, and other posts that do a good job of explaining things to people.

some questions that would really help if they were answered are:

What are some ways that general people on the internet could make your life easier?

What are some ways that the general population could make your in person life easier?

What are some ways people you know personally could make your life easier?

What are some things you really dislike people doing regarding your disability?

What media do you think does a good job representing your disability?

Do you have a social media account concerning your disability that you’d like for me to include in my section of further resources?

Do you have any positivity you would like to share about your disability?

answer as many or as few of these as you’d like, and this is of course non-comprehensive, so feel free to include any other information that you’d like to.

If you think you’ll answer all or most of these, I’d appreciate you filling out the survey linked at the bottom. It will have two sections. The first asks for information on your disability (for organization purposes in the accommodation sheet), and the second asks for actual accommodations.

If you only wish to answer one or two (or have questions/comments/concerns), you can answer in the comments, reblogs, or my dms.

Within he information spreadsheet itself, some disabilities will have entire sections, others will be categorized into sections depending on what makes the most sense. This has nothing to do with perceived importance/severity of the disability, merely with whether the information is generalizable to other disabilities in a category :)

It is also currently in the workshop stage, so if you have any tips on ways to make using the spreadsheet a more enjoyable experience, I'd love that too!

Questionnaire

Accommodation Anthology

(sorry if this reads like a corporate survey btw. I really just wanted to include as much info as I could)

[girlwith15cents]

Oversharing on the internet about ADHD

I've been trying to write this post for awhile now. It relates to my previous post about mental disabilities. But it's proving difficult cause it keeps sounding too pathetic, but that's kinda the point.

I, in my present, have an idea of who I am. My interests, how I act, how I dress, who I associate with, my gender expression. These are all observable things. Ways that other people can form opinions on me. These are, by most means, who I am.

However, who I want to be is pretty drastically separate from that. I know a version of me that I can try and project but will always fall short of. I want to learn and enjoy makeup. I want a larger wardrobe of clothes that I genuinely like. I want to learn an instrument. I want to get into streaming games for fun. I want to be able to take my friends out to dinner and buy them gifts and go around the city with them. I have so many ideas for tattoos and I have piercings I want to get. There are so many things I want and yet cannot have and have no real avenue to get.

The reason I cannot reach for these (very reasonable) things is because of my lack of capital and personal agency. Extremely debilitating executive dysfunction has stripped me of any milestones of adulthood someone of my age might be seeing. I've never been able to hold a job without growing deeply suicidal due to the effort required. Hobbies cost money. Rent costs money. Expressions of the self cost money. I have always had to exist within the confines of someone else's generosity to take care of me. It has stripped me of opportunities to grow as a person. It has made me less and less who I want to be and more who I am.

All too often because of this people don't take me seriously. Financial burden that I am, I have learned to make myself small better than any other skill. I choke up when asked to assert my wants. I put others first. I'm quiet and guarded. Any strive to make myself the person I want to be feels deeply embarrassing. Like a child who is convinced they're something they aren't. So people who meet me see the child. They see the loser who won't take steps towards employment because they're lazy. They see the girl who orbits a social group but never belongs. They see a nice girl who has far less desirable qualities than the other candidate for this job position. It hurts so fucking bad to be condescended to without any ability to rebut it.

So when does it end? When I find work that won't end up being the death of me? When our government wises up and pushes for UBI or expands upon disability payments? When they invent adderal that doesn't have a million side effects? When I get sick of it and give up? There's no real end in sight, and every time ADHD gets laughed at as a pop-psych joke it gets further away. Am I doomed to be a child forever? When will I see the respect I know I deserve?

And sure, pathologizing behavior is 'bad'. Maybe the answer to all my woes is to grit my teeth harder than I already have been my entire life. Maybe the real reason I see no forward movement is because I'm projecting my own helplessness. But can't it be a little easier? Everyone else is having a rough time, but at least they're having a time. The behavior I exhibit is very normal to neurotypical people on a bad day, but it makes up my entire existence. And it sure feels a hell of a lot more severe than someone having a day of bad focus.

The fucked up thing about it is that I like me. The present me and the me I want to be. We both have so much to offer. We're both one of the best friends you've ever had. We both have skills and qualities that make us very likeable people. But these qualities have little to no monetary value. Any way that I could monetize it would also require investment. Investment that I cannot make without agency. So I'm stuck as a vague bundle of good qualities and talents that everyone sees so much potential in and is eagerly awaiting a moment where I channel it somewhere. A moment that will never occur without agency.

[incaseofart]

Wendy's Plush Making Starter Pack

Hello! I'm far from an expert at plushie making, but it's been a super fun journey for me and I've seen some folks express interest in learning to do this themselves. Now, that said, this is not actually really a guide to how to make plushies. This is a starter pack of resources that I found helpful to get me started! The most important thing is being willing to go look for resources, but it is intimidating at first because...where do you even start? That's the question I aim to answer!

This was one the first videos I watched - this will help you understand what it takes to get started. There's also an entire playlist with even more details associated! I only watched the intro vid because I was raring to go. Because of this video, I decided to work with anti-pilled fleece initially, due to the fact that minky is stretchy and that complicates matters. Fleece is also cheaper and in my experience easier to find in a store.

Next up, I thought it was best to start with a simple, free pattern for a few reasons.

if you start too complex, you're likely to be hit with catastrophic failure, and that can be really disheartening! Simple patterns can be completed relatively quickly, so if you mess up and it isn't how you want, it's a lot less painful than failure after two weeks of work or more. And trust me, you will fail and learn a LOT from those failures at the start! Do not expect perfection at first.

Free is a good place to start because if you try this out and find out you hate it, it's nice to not have spent a lot of money. That said, patterns are also often pretty cheap, so it's probably not unreasonable to go buy a pattern if you can't find a free one you like. It's up to you and your budget.

The pattern I first started with was this Poke'mon tsum tsum one!

It even comes with a free download of the pattern. This is a great one because it's very simple to start with. I had to make adjustments to the patterns due to using fleece (pikachu's ears wouldn't stay up straight the way the felt would), and ultimately I made large edits to the pattern to make my favorite characters. I also added embroidery because that was also something I wanted to learn.

My only other comment about this vid is that while the stitch they use is fine, I've since switched to using a straight stitch or a back stitch which I think are a bit more standard and useful long term. You can find out how to do those by searching for them on youtube! They're very standard and simple so I'm not including any specifics videos on them. My understanding is the back stitch is better when you need something to be a little extra sturdy, but again the internet can guide you better than I can there.

One other stitch that I wish I had known sooner is the ladder stitch, or invisible stitch.

This is a great tutorial that I found easily by googling. it includes a video (REALLY HELPFUL) as well as written instructions with pictures. This is great for closing up your plushies at the end, or for attaching pieces like hair or maybe accessories to the main plushie without using glue or having an ugly seam. That said, I did use glue for many of my tsum tsums because of how small they were, and in some cases I personally feel like that's still the correct choice, but this is REALLY good to have in your arsenal.

Once you're satisfied with a simpler pattern, you can make it more complex by adding details or modifying the pattern, or by moving on to a new pattern!

Okay, phew, so that's sewing! Let's talk about embroidery. You CAN make plushies without embroidery - you can glue on bits like in the Poke'mon tsum video, or depending on your fabric you can draw a face on, or maybe something else I haven't thought of, but I'm me and I like a challenge and detail oriented work so I opted for embroidery.

The most important of these for plushies in my experience has been what is called "stem" here, but I've also seen it referred to as "outline". Secondly, there's "satin" and "long and short" for filling, but I actually have another video with even more details on filling.

Satin stitch is what I used for all the fills on my tsum plushies. Thread saver is great because it really does save a ton of thread, and guess what? We don't care how the back looks because it's, you know, going to be inside a plushie. I'm currently learning the long and short methods, both blend and brick, and there's a bunch of other neat ones here.

What I'd really like to do next is link the amazing 20cm plushie embroidery video I learned from - but unfortunately, it's gone because yt terminated the account. So a quick summary of the points I recall:

Do an outline stitch for each part, in the color you are going to fill with. To fill it, go from the outside of the outline stitch, across, and to the outside again. Repeat.

Instead of filling by going directly next to the previous stitch, it can be easier to go halfway through the unfilled space. Then, go halfway again. Then, halfway again. Eventually your stitches will be directly next to each other, and it will be filled. This is less thread efficient but this is mostly what I do because it's easier for me to understand.

Use 1, 2, or 3 strands of embroidery thread depending on your fabric and what you're doing. If you don't know, embroidery floss comes in 6 threads that are all wrapped together, and you are able to separate them. For my fleece, if I'm doing an outline that isn't part of a fill, so for example the mouth which is just a curve for a smile, I tend to do 3 strands. For my outlines and fills, I tend to do 2 strands. You can then use single strands to cover in gaps in your fill, though I'm usually too lazy do this and just use 2 strands the entire time.

That'll about cover it. If you go on youtube, you can search "20 cm doll" or "cotton doll" if that's the specific type of doll you want to make. You can also experiment and try things out! I think that's pretty key to learning myself.

As for my own tips, in general:

Embroidery paper is the best thing ever. It's sticky, but water soluble, and you can write or print on it. So basically, put your pattern on the embroidery paper, stick it on your fabric, and them embroider over it. This helps stabilize the fabric in the hoop, and also helps you make nice neat lines. Life saver.

There are cheaper alternatives to embroidery paper, like water or air soluble pens and pencils, or like transfer sheets (you draw on top of them over the fabric, and the ink transfers to the fabric, and then can be washed off). Lots of options for different budgets! I've only used embroidery paper so I can't speak to the effectiveness.

Embroidery hoops - big ones look cool and tempting but will be hard on your hands and wrists. A friend told me you don't want the hoop to have a radius longer than your fingers if you can avoid it.

THIMBLES! Sometimes it is hard to push the needle through, and thimbles help prevent you from stabbing yourself or in some cases make it possible at all. For my fleece + embroidery paper, I need a thimble or the back of the pin will pierce my skin. I use some cheap rubber thimbles because they feel better to me than metal, but I might invest in some less cheap ones soon.

If you can draw on the back of your fabric, trace the patterns on that way and then cut them. While you can cut by pinning the pattern to the fabric, I've definitely found that harder and my impression from watching vids is that most plush artists draw the pattern on the back and cut it out.

PROTOTYPE, PROTOTYPE, PROTOTYPE! When trying something new, use scrap or other cheap/plentiful fabric to try it out first. You don't want to do all your embroidery only to realize once you've sewn everything up that your pattern needed modifications. Yikes! (I've been there and it sucks) It may feel like a waste of time, but you'll thank yourself when you didn't waste time and potentially more expensive materials only to find you did it wrong.

Embroidery floss - I use DMC, but you can use any brand really! I've heard satin can be a bit harder to use, but haven't had that experience myself.

Lastly: LOOK STUFF UP!!! There's so many resources out there. Find a cool video but you don't need it yet? Save it somewhere so you can watch it when you do! Example, I nabbed a resource on making plushie clothes during a sale from a small artist late last year. I haven't used it yet, but I will be, so I keep it in a resources folder for when I need it! Similarly, I'm about to start embroidering on minky, so I plan to go on youtube and look for tips on how to do that since it's a bit different than fleece

secretly lastly, GO FOLLOW PLUSH MAKERS YOU ADMIRE! It will be inspirational and a lot of them time they sell patterns or how-to guides and then you can support an artist while also getting something super valuable for yourself!!!

Have fun! Make stuff! I'm not an expert but I'm living my best life! Feel free to add your own tips if you want!

[dayntee]

You know, I’ve seen a lot of horrible shit on the internet. 10+ years in community management (and honestly even longer since basically the dawn of the internet, as an elder millennial) will do that. I totally get when I see comments like “the internet was a mistake” or “don’t waste your time on random internet strangers.”

And some of that is true. Like most technology, the human race made something cool and then immediately found the most heinous things they could do with it, often doubling down year after year. Plenty of people online are, in fact, shitbags and shouldn’t be trusted.

But I also can’t fully prescribe to the idea that we’d be better off without it or that it had never happened. Honestly? I probably would not have survived high school or even my most recent stint of unemployment without it. Because the internet has given me meaningful connections I would have never found otherwise.

I’ve made friends for life through work, fandom, and online games. People I love and cherish even if I may never know their real name or see their faces.

And the awful people I’ve met? I find they filter themselves out pretty quickly, casting a spotlight on their garbage out of some demented form of pride. Once you know how to spot it, it gets easier to avoid. If you can learn and have the tools to ignore it, even better. Like any bully, starving them of the attention they crave is the fastest way to combat them.

It’s not fool proof. Some people are just that determined to be shitbags. But I find their noise so insignificant in the face of the veritable horde of positivity, compassion, and friendship I’ve found in my community spaces.

I like to think I lead by example; I try to pour out love and support whenever I can, because I’m paying it forward. In doing so, I’ve had so many magical moments come back to me. I wouldn’t be here without the kindness I’ve been blessed with by internet friends. I wouldn’t have my career. I probably wouldn’t have my husband (even if he has his own rightful reasons to hate and avoid the internet too).

I’m gonna keep putting good out there whenever I can. And if something stupid and cruel and selfish comes your way and you feel that weight of the algorithm bearing down to feed you nothing but pain and hate, but you’ve seen this post?

Well, at least one internet weirdo out there is thinking about you, wishing you the best, and hoping you find a little light amongst the dark.

Back to aggressively supporting my friends, faceless and otherwise. ❤️

[benkyoutobentou]

How to study languages without studying

Whether you're just starting out and have had bad experiences with textbook learning in the past or are getting burnt out from prepping for the next proficiency test, it's never a bad idea to put the textbooks away for a time and just enjoy your target language. If you're new to the world of immersion, here are a few ways to get you started.

Follow along with the lyrics of a song. Spotify's not-so-new-anymore lyrics feature is great for this, especially since it has timed lyrics, but it doesn't have every song.

Expert mode: Write out the lyrics and underline/highlight/make note of all the words and grammar structures you don't know. Learn these unknowns until you can understand the whole song!

Extra challenge: Translate a song from your target language. I usually tend to stay away from translations in my study, but for those of you who aspire to be translators (or already are!), the poetic nature of song lyrics can be a fun challenge.

Watch a show or movie. Netflix has now introduced a feature where you can sort by language! If there's nothing made in your language that you're interested in, it also gives the option to sort by shows and movies that have the audio or subtitles available. Internet Archive also tends to have lots of foreign films that I'm looking for.

Easy mode: Watch with English or your native language subtitles. When doing this, try to still listen to what's being said and pick up on words and phrases that you know, or match new words with their translation in the subtitles. Note: reading one language and listening to another is a skill in and of itself! Don't be discouraged if you can't do both at the same time yet, you're brain is still making the connections in intonation and cadence of the language.

Hard mode: Watch with captions in your target language. This helps you connect listening and reading, especially in languages where the spelling isn't exactly phonetic, or it uses a different alphabet than what you're used to.

Expert mode: No captions or subtitles! But who knows, maybe you're better at listening comprehension than I am. Make sure you're getting comprehensible input here; some shows and movies are much harder than others. But above all else, watch what keeps your interest. A movie where you can catch half the dialogue but is super engaging is better for you than an "easy" movie that you're going to spend your time ignoring.

Polyglot mode?: Watch something in your target language with subtitles in a different target language. This adds just one too many layers of obfuscation for me, but if you're into the challenge, more power to you.

Watch YouTube. You can change your language preference on YouTube, and with that, the Explore section will give you recommendations in your target language. Going into the trending tab with your target language can give you a good idea about what people are interested in in the countries where your target language is spoken.

Read something. It can be a book, it can be a comic. There are plenty of webcomics out there in a number of languages! There's also probably an English language listicle with recommendations of easier to understand webcomics for learners, too.

If you're just getting started in immersion, you can choose whether you focus on intensive reading or extensive reading (this actually goes for all kinds of immersion, but is easiest to control with reading since it happens at your own pace). Intensive reading is reading with the goal of understanding everything 100%. If you don't understand a word, or a grammar point, or the reading of a character, look it up. Extensive reading is reading just to get the gist of things. Look up words and grammar points only if they stop you from understanding the general meaning of the sentence or section. And of course, the more you immerse, the less you'll have to look things up, but remember that difficulty varies between materials, even within books of the same age range, genre, and medium.

A small digression: If you decide that you never want to open a textbook on your language learning journey, more power to you! It can be done and I know people who have gotten to proficient levels of their target language without textbooks. If you want this to be you, extensive immersion is your best friend. You also might want to get comfortable with the flashcard program anki, because, if this is your goal, all those unknown grammar points and words will probably end up there. But at the end of the day, language learning is an intensely personal journey, and what works for others won't necessarily work for you. Finding what works for you is just part of learning a language.

Play a game. Lots of games are region locked (hint: Pokemon Sun/Moon isn't! If you start a new game, you can choose which language you want to play it in), but there are plenty of free online games still lurking in the corners of the internet. With a bit of googling, you can probably find something in your target language. Just the other day, I went out to find one of those hidden item games in Japanese and ended up finding an entire site dedicated to user made browser games.

If you're learning Japanese or Korean, picrew might be fun to look through as well. I noticed that plenty of picrews have basic anatomy vocabulary. I'm not super familiar with picrew myself, but the ones I've seen tend to be in Korean and Japanese

And lastly, don't fully give up on textbooks before trying them out. Don't be discouraged if textbooks truly aren't your thing, but studying a language on your own time can feel much different than studying for school. Don't put too much pressure on yourself and just have fun with your language. Additionally, if you'd rather learn in a video format, many languages have full courses uploaded to YouTube for you to try. Finding these can be difficult for some languages though, so don't hesitate to reach out to other learners and see what they recommend!

Got your materials ready? Great! Now go forth and immerse!

[cripple-punk-dad]

i hope you don’t mind this but like i’m 14 (not white, trans, gay, that stuff) and seeing a lot of people talk about how a lot of countries are going far right & extremism is coming back in full swing & no rainbow capitalism, etc is kind of scary. how do i like. not be so scared all the time? i just thought you’d know but if this is a weird ask i totally get it

It is scary. It's downright terrifying, looking out into the world and seeing the pattern of hatred, bigotry, and violence that is feels like its only growing more prevalent. Sometimes it feels like I'm on an island in a huge ocean of people who just want me to die, or change who I am, or both.

Not only that, but being 14 is fucking terrifying. You're not an adult yet, so you can't enact 'real change', you can't even drive (in the U.S) so your transportation is limited. You can't (legally) even get a job or anything. The world has done pretty much everything it can to keep you feeling scared. That's really hard to deal with!

This is usually where I'd say something dramatic, like "don't let them get away with that." But that's easier said than done. And that doesn't really answer your question, either. So instead I'll say this: It's hard to be scared when you 1) know your enemy, and 2) have other things to focus on. I don't mean that you should go debate every conservative you see, or even interact with them. But taking the time to understand the ideologies of fascism, alt-right conservatism, TERFS, white supremacists, etc. not only helps you to see how wrong they are, but also how they always fail and will continue to fail. This is also a good time to research and reinforce your own ideologies and beliefs. No one is immune to propaganda, but it's a lot easier to recognize it if you know what you're looking for.

But don't let that consume you. Remember, these people want you to be scared and isolated. If you spend all your time obsessing over everything wrong with the world (which is very easy with social media and the internet) then the people who want you gone will only grow stronger. So it really is a good idea to fight against that by building up a community of friends, and by building yourself up too. What I mean is this: Go outside, look at the ground, find a weird bug you don't know anything about. Read the obituaries in a newspaper. Go dumpster diving. Learn about something that interests you. Write a letter to somebody and never send it (or do). Pick up a weird hobby. You can just start gluing shit together, no one is gonna stop you, there are a lot less rules than you think.

But above all, remember that while history is full of empires collapsing, and wars, and horrors beyond imagination. The fall of Rome didn't happen overnight, it happened over centuries. But even in the midst of all that, people still made art, and had families, and not only survived, but lived fulfilling lives. I promise that you can and will be able to do that too. The sun will continue to shine, the grass will continue to grow, and the Earth will keep on spinning.