Sharpie Tie Dye Shirts

Ever since the baby was born, I've been making a deliberate effort to carve out some one on one time with my older daughter. We call it Mommy-Daughter Dates. Sometimes its simple, like going to the grocery store while Daddy stays home with baby. Sometimes we go to the pool or do a craft. This week we made sharpie tie dye shirts.

 

The idea for this shirt came from Butterfly Jungle's Fireworks t-shirt who shares a great tutorial on the subject. Basically, you take a Sharpie or other permanent marker and make dots and lines in a small circular pattern. Then you use a medicine dropper to drop rubbing alcohol onto the center of each circle. The rubbing alcohol makes the colors bleed, resembling a tie dyed shirt.

This was a fun and simple craft that my four year old and I enjoyed doing together. And the results were quite impressive. Even better than I had hoped. Look how pretty her shirt is!

Although a word to the wise .... don't skimp on the heat setting part! Butterfly Jungle recommends 4 min of ironing followed by 20 mins tumbling in a hot dryer. I only did a quick ironing and skipped the dryer. Results? The colors bled just a smidge during the first washing. My daughter hasn't notice the difference, but next time I will follow the directions a bit more thoroughly :-)