Maddy saw the cutest tie-dye dress at the weekend and immediately wanted it...it got me thinking that this may be a good craft project that I could get my little cherubs involved in.
We headed out (with a trusty JoAnns coupon) and found the Jacquard Tie Dye Kit and picked up a few t-shirts to try it out on.
After a scan of the instructions, we got to work. The t-shirts (and I added 3 pieces of white fabric) needed to be saturated with water and then wrung dry to begin with. Then the real fun began.
We swirled the first t-shirt..
and carried on until it was a little swirl ball.
I then added elastic bands to secure it and to section it up into 'pie segments' (elastic bands were included in the kit)
I wanted us to try a few techniques on these shirts to get an idea of the looks that we like. For the next shirt we folded it (like folding a paper fan)
Once folded, I tied elastic bands along the length of the shirt
The next shirt was scrunched up into a little ball in no particular order...I then secured it with elastic bands
Once they were all ready, they had to be submerged into a bucket of water with soda ash (included in the kit) for 20 minutes
After wringing the excess water off we were finally ready for the exciting bit!
This is where the kids and I got rather excited and forgot to follow proper 'procedure' It is usually at this point you would ensure that all parties involved would have gloves, aprons and preferable old clothes on...I seemed to miss that memo and the kids and I ended up with dye on our hands before I clicked on!
After realising my oops, I quickly ushered the kids to put gloves on (at which point Josh lost interest and went inside to play with his Lego!) and Mads and I finished the task!
There were three colours in the kit (the primary colours) and then an extra bottle with instructions on how to mix them to get greens, purple, broan, orange etc..
We opted to stick with our three colours and overlapping them to create variations on the t-shirts naturally
The pie segments technique (above)
Folded and tied teachnique (above)
scrunched in a ball technique (above)
They were then all laid out to dry for 24 hours (the t-shirts are in their own bags at the top and the extra pieces of fabric I dyed are laid flat)
After an agonising wait (are they ready yet Mum, are they ready yet? how about now?) I brought all of the bags in and rinsed each one until the water ran clear. They were now ready for their final stage - to be machine washed and dried.
All in all they have been a HUGE success. Whilst I am not terrible enamoured with the 'ball technique' and resulting brownness, it seems to be a hit with Josh.
The folded t-shirt is really bright and vibrant and I like the white throughout it.
Both kiddies were very impressed with the swirled design - especially when just two colours were used. It makes quite an impact.
Maddy used the same swirl technique on her strappy tee, but mixed all three colours and didn't completely soak the t-shirt with the colours, hence the mix of white also. She is uber happy with this one!
I also have the three pieces of fabric that I dyed that I have big plans for a 4th July project. So as much as I would love to focus on getting my ghosts and ghoulies quilt finished (that now has borders!) with 4th July fast approaching I think I better focus on that for now!
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