another tie dye question, designs...?

Ok, glad this is here.
Do you remember cutting out hearts from a piece of paper folded in half?

you'll need that skill.
For SYMETRICAL designs, fold the shirt in half and draw LIGHTLY with a crayon (soy ones rock and wash out better) one half of the design.
using a needle and thread, outline that line using medium to high tension. the tighter the pull , the sharper the white left (tie dye is a resist dye, like batik, just using pressure)
Tying/ folding can be done. It requires more contortions of the shirt / fabric.
for the leaf I think you mean, the shirt, again folded in half, wil need to be gathered for the top leaf (half as fat as the remaining leaves) and at leastthree more radiating out. Apply dye carefully and with a strong border.
the stem can be placed with dye only, no binding.
We use cardboard/ stencils on very rare occasion. six or seven times in 12 years. Two of them were for matching big pieces. on shirts we used the lid of the soak bucket for circles.
we have a modified compass for circles bigger than that.

Any sinew users out here?

 

if you use big needles, yes, it would.
see our stuff: only rayon is inclined to holes, and we notice that it is because we get in a hurry. (but we want to SEE them!!!!)
www.tiedyepaul.com (some broken links: guess what my next project is)
or www.angelfire.com/biz/TieDyePaul