Thursday, July 5, 2012

Tie Dye Saves the Day

Things were starting to unravel the other morning around here - the boys were fighting over everything and I was yelling at them to stop fighting.  So in keeping with my summer plan I grabbed my summer idea list and we picked an activity - Tie Dye T-shirts! 

I bought this kit last year but we never got around to making them, so I dusted off the box and we quickly began to prepare our "Tie Dye Station"!  My littlest guy was in charge of getting all the shirts wet {translation: getting himself, the kitchen, and the t-shirts all wet!}.  My big little guy was in charge of taping down a plastic trash bag and paper towels on the craft table {translation: using a roll of tape to tape down a trash bag}.  My job was preparing the dye {no translation necessary}. 


Once our "Station" was ready we picked out a design offered in our instructions. The boys both liked the "swirl" design.  We twirled the shirts into a cinnamon roll by pinching the middle of the shirt and kept on twisting until the whole shirt was twisted into a swirl.  Then we used 3 rubber bands to section the circle into 6 pie slices.

Now the fun part - using the dye!  We decided we needed 4th of July shirts this year, so our dye colors were red and blue {the white was the t-shirts}.  The boys were able to apply the dye with a little guidance from me. We only had a few moments of dye flying in the air. 


Did I mention we were doing this inside because it was raining? If possible, I think this is an outside activity - less to worry about!

Once the dye was applied all that was left to do was to wrap the bundles in plastic wrap and let them sit for 6-8 hrs.  

That night I cut the rubber bands off and then washed the t-shirts in hot water and a dash of detergent in the washing machine. In the dryer they went and out came some AWESOME T-DYE SHIRTS!

I went ahead and made shirts for the Mr and myself while we had everything out - I just grabbed one of the Mr's old undershirts and a white tank of mine that was not as white as it use to be.

We were that family on the 4th all dressed alike...I know it's cheesy but sometimes I really enjoy a bit of cheesiness! 

 The boys loved making a shirt that they can wear.  It saved me a trip to Target to buy 4th of July shirts. Most of all this was a fun, inexpensive activity that saved the day. 


Simple Home Life: Features & Simply Creations Link Party #64
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Happy Hour Projects: Happy Hour Friday Link Party

1 comment:

  1. Oh, they turned out awesome. :) Thanks for dropping by Happy Hour Projects - following you now!

    Adrianne
    Happy Hour Projects

    ReplyDelete