First Craft of the Season

Hello to the three people who read my craft blog! I am so excited that it is summertime again and I can find every way possible to keep my kids from becoming summer screen zombies. 

You, too? 

Good--I knew we were meant to be friends. 

We have a tradition now of making the first craft of the season a tie-dye project. That way they can wear their creation all summer long. This year we had some western visitors (my sister and her three glorious children whom I would gladly adopt if she let me) and each of them got to make their own shirt. 

Here is the before:

And here is the after. 

The whole process is pretty easy:

1. Buy a white t-shirt (if you want your final project to look good, get a quality shirt that fits well) and tie-dye paints 

2. Dampen the shirts by putting them in the washer's rinse/spin cycle

3. Tie with rubber bands. 

4. Paint! There are lots of different techniques.

For instance, this is how you make a bulls eye:

Or, you can make a gradient or "fading" design by painting sections of your shirt with the regular, concentrated paint and then diluting your paint for the next section:

Several of us made spiral shirts by winding the fabric up in a tight pinwheel, securing the fabric with rubber bands and then painting:

Or, if you hate to follow directions, you can always just tie rubber bands where ever you want. The great thing about tie-dying is that almost anything looks cool...although with practice you can make it cooler.

5. Then you put each shirt in a separate plastic sack and let it sit for 6-8 hours to set.

6. After the shirts have set, and before you wash them, you must rinse each shirt to take out the extra dye. This is is an important step. If you skip this and you wash all the shirts together, there will be too much dye in the washer and your colors will be dull and greyish instead of vibrant.

7. Wash in washer on largest load setting and hottest water to help set the color.

8. Tumble dry

9. Wear and embrace your inner hippie. 

See you on the next craft....