I know that tie dye isn’t necessarily the “in” thing right now, but my kids are totally diggin’ it.

Last year, the day before school started, we had a fun tie dye session with a ton of friends. One of Hunter’s shirt was dubbed as his “special” shirt and he frequently requested it. Of course, it has seen better days and he is growing out of it. It was time for a new one…So I decided, tie dye the day before school starts just might be our little tradition.

Here is a step by step instruction guide:

Supply list included –
Shirts (washed)
Rubber gloves
Rubber bands
Several plastic bags
Plastic Bottles
Dye – I’ve used a variety of dyes. You can buy special dye (made specifically for tie dye) at JoAnns or Michaels (with a 40% coupon). RIT dye – not my favorite method, the color tends to fade more with RIT. Or buy specialty dye online – www.prochemicalanddye.com (My friend uses this method). They have a huge variety of colors and a step by step instructions on how to use the dye. You will need to buy a couple other products to complete this process, but the color selection and color retention in fabric is worth it!




Make sure the shirts are good and wet. (if using dye from Pro Chem – follow their instructions!)

With the wet shirts, use the rubber bands to create different designs. We did a wide variety, and this is where the kids really can help out and have some fun. We used youtube to figure how to create certain designs. Several times, we had no clue what we were doing, but every single one turned out great!

At this point, we somewhat excused Hunter (for obvious reasons) and allowed Hallie to let her creative juices flow! We used only three colors – red, blue, yellow – and using the rubber gloves we started squirting the die on the wet shirts. Some shirts we only used one color, other shirts were a rainbow of colors.



After the shirts were good and saturated with dye, we let them sit in a plastic bag for a while. (once again, follow the directions on whatever dye you purchase.)

Rinse with cold water several times and then wash WITHOUT ANYTHING ELSE!! This is a very important step and you will be gravely disappointed if you disregard this step!


And here is the result. Each kid made 5 shirts (that is how Hanes sells them!) and they use them as sleep shirts.  

Although not totally “in”, we will definitely keep up with this as long as the kids enjoy doing it. I’m tempted to do it again during the holidays as their Christmas eve sleep shirt…we’ll see…