Tie Dyed

I know you've seen them...tie dyed shirts.  They are all over Pinterest.  People make their own dye's, some use acrylic paints, some just go and buy dye like Rit and get creative.  I'm creative, to an extent.  My kids wanted to to tie dye and I was all for it, but I was buying a kit.  I used my 50% off coupon at the craft store and we got busy.  My kids don't like their shirts to be entirely colorful, they wanted some white to show through.  That being said, the kit we purchased was enough to dye 5 shirts.  We dyed 6 shirts varying in size from Youth Medium to Adult Medium and we still have an ample amount of dye to do at least 3 more shirts. First you have to be sure to have some pretty important supplies on hand.

100% cotton tie dyables (shirts, shorts, bandannas, hats, whatever)

Lots of rubber bands

Gloves (if you don't want to look like an umpaloompa for a few days)

Newspaper or Grassy Area

Cooling Rack (optional)

Dye

Water

Soda Ash

Squirt Bottles

Zip Top Bags

The kit I bought came with gloves, 3 colors of dye, squirt bottles, rubber bands and soda ash.  All for $6.00!

We twisted, turned, rubber banded and dyed our shirts.  Sorry, no photos of the dye process.  That was too messy with the kids participating.  It's easy though, just make sure whatever colors you dye the top side, you do the same on the back side.

During rubber banding, I learned that working from the back side of the shirt vs the collar side was easiest to manipulate.  

Placed them into Zip top bags overnight.

Actually wound up being about 30 hours.  Carefully, cut all the rubber bands and rinse under running water.  I then washed all of the shirts in a cold wash with a tablespoonful of vinegar and let them air dry outside.

Here they are, cool huh!

Yup, that's Pinteresting!