Tie Dye Instructions for Spiral Mickey Shirt

[vetbeth]

Question-

Before I start, I washed the shirts, but wasn't thinking and threw a dryer sheet in with them. Do I need to rewash them before I start?

Beth

 

[iu97alum]

Ok, shirts are dyed and waiting for overnight soaking. I think I might have put too much dye in mine though..... We'll see how they turn out romorrow night. Wonder, can I rinse them in the washmachine or do I need to rinse them separately in a bucket first??

 

[MNRMommy]

Ok, shirts are dyed and waiting for overnight soaking. I think I might have put too much dye in mine though..... We'll see how they turn out romorrow night. Wonder, can I rinse them in the washmachine or do I need to rinse them separately in a bucket first??

a LOT of dye comes out when you rince so I don't think I would chance doing it in the washing machine. We have a sink in our laundry room and we rince the badazies out of them in there as we cut out the rubber bands. It is kind of like when you dye your hair if you do it yourself and you feel like you will be in the shower forever waiting for the water to run clear LOL I wouldn't want to chance any of that getting caught up in my washing machine somewhere and coming back to visit me in my next load.

 

[MNRMommy]

I have been away from the threads for awhile and came back to quite a lot of new pages here. It is nice to see the thread I started so long ago is going strong. I love catching up and looking at all the new shirts. I think it has re-inspired me to do some red/green ones for our holiday trip in Dec. Great job everyone.

 

[iu97alum]

a LOT of dye comes out when you rince so I don't think I would chance doing it in the washing machine. We have a sink in our laundry room and we rince the badazies out of them in there as we cut out the rubber bands. It is kind of like when you dye your hair if you do it yourself and you feel like you will be in the shower forever waiting for the water to run clear LOL I wouldn't want to chance any of that getting caught up in my washing machine somewhere and coming back to visit me in my next load.

Thanks!! I'll rinse them outside. Maybe I can get the other patch of grass to match. I'm hoping my fingers will be less "colorful" by the time we sail on Sunday......

I know, I wore gloves for the first half (dying the mickey heads) but they just got in the way more than helped.... So I guess I better wear them for rinsing if I don't want them darker!

I have been away from the threads for awhile and came back to quite a lot of new pages here. It is nice to see the thread I started so long ago is going strong. I love catching up and looking at all the new shirts. I think it has re-inspired me to do some red/green ones for our holiday trip in Dec. Great job everyone.

No, no, THANK YOU for making it easy for US to do this!

 

[vetbeth]

My husband says he'll wear the Mickey shirt if I also tie-dye a pair of tights. Is it possible to do the spiral pattern on tights?

 

[disbugsmomma]

I think maybe, if you did several small spirals. I don't think a large spiral would work too well, but you never know. Now I want to try it and see how it turns out.

 

[MNRMommy]

My husband says he'll wear the Mickey shirt if I also tie-dye a pair of tights. Is it possible to do the spiral pattern on tights?

I think you should just tie dye them, not spiral tie dye. With my luck if I tried to spiral dye tights it would end up with the swirl spinning out from my behind like a big ole target on my big ole booty and no one needs to see that

 

[lucigo]

To those of you lately who have posted shirts that didn't come out quite the way you wanted....take a bleach pen and draw a swirl mickey on the shirt, it will still look really cool

 

[iu97alum]

To those of you lately who have posted shirts that didn't come out quite the way you wanted....take a bleach pen and draw a swirl mickey on the shirt, it will still look really cool

WOW! You're totally right!! Awesome!!

 

[iu97alum]

The directions were great! Ours turned out great:
DD#2's shirt, mine and nana's:

Top row - DD#1's, DH's:

and two pillow cases:

And my model this morning:

I think soaking them in soda ash really helped keep them bright!!!

Only problem is there is a small hole in DH's shirt. guess I must have somehow pulled on the floss. Now I have to figure out how to fix that so it doesn't get any bigger. Any suggestions?

Lessons learned:
1. Wear gloves. Really. And not the ones in those kits. They are terrible. We had a box of gloves left over from Emy's surgeries (having to change bandages) and I used those to rinse. SO much better than the crappy ones in the kit.
2. Gather the floss as you're sewing. It makes for a tighter mickey head and more defined. You can tell on those I didn't and those I did (mine!)
3. It takes time!!! I drew the pattern and did the stitching. Probably 45 mins (but I also had a 3 & 5 yo trying to "help"!). Then soaking took 30 mins in the soda ash. Then they dying took 1 1/2 hrs (i'm slow!) Then let them "soak" over night. I used an old bucket. Glad I did b/c apparently I didn't wrap them well. One of the hints was to put them in plastic grocery sacks. I ran out and had to use saran wrap and those were the ones that leaked! Then rinsing ~15 minutes. Then I threw them in the wash for a full wash cycle and two more rinse cycles to make sure the water ran clean.
4. You CAN do this. I was really worrried about it. I read, read and re-read the instructions until I got up the courage. I was positively GIDDY when I saw the results last night.
5. Use squirt bottles for the dye. I didn't attempt to use a bucket but I LOVE the eas of using a bottle. Easier to navigate!!

sooooo.. what do you think?

 

[iu97alum]

Emy wants her mickey head to be a Minnie. ANy ideas on how to put a bow on her head????

 

[MNRMommy]

Emy wants her mickey head to be a Minnie. ANy ideas on how to put a bow on her head????

you could allways do a sew on patch bow or make a fabric bow and attach it. It is just so hard to get the cut in the ears right I think that if you tried to do it with the dye it would all run into the ears.

 

[iu97alum]

Question-

Before I start, I washed the shirts, but wasn't thinking and threw a dryer sheet in with them. Do I need to rewash them before I start?

Beth

I think so. Something about the fabric softerner I think messes up the dye adhering to the shirts..

 

[becky54321]

My husband says he'll wear the Mickey shirt if I also tie-dye a pair of tights. Is it possible to do the spiral pattern on tights?

i actually did tie dye tights. it was my DD's idea, though. we didn't try for a spiral pattern, we just used the same colors as on the shirts and did kind of a splotchy pattern with no plan.

the colors didn't match, they were more like shades of each other instead, but they actually looked great together. i kind of think if the tights and shirts matched exactly it wouldn't have looked right - it would've been too much.

DD wore her shirt and tights with a skirt (she's in that phase when she always wears skirts or dresses), but i opted for shorts, to be different. we got LOTS of compliments, mainly on the shirts of course, but i'd say at least a quarter of the compliments were on our full ensembles!

i say go for it! i liked it enough that i've since worn the outfit at home, too.

 

[MNRMommy]

i actually did tie dye tights. it was my DD's idea, though. we didn't try for a spiral pattern, we just used the same colors as on the shirts and did kind of a splotchy pattern with no plan.

the colors didn't match, they were more like shades of each other instead, but they actually looked great together. i kind of think if the tights and shirts matched exactly it wouldn't have looked right - it would've been too much.

DD wore her shirt and tights with a skirt (she's in that phase when she always wears skirts or dresses), but i opted for shorts, to be different. we got LOTS of compliments, mainly on the shirts of course, but i'd say at least a quarter of the compliments were on our full ensembles!

i say go for it! i liked it enough that i've since worn the outfit at home, too.

I am very honored your first post was here on our little ole thread

 

[momsoftwins]

ok.,..i have a ? for u all
i dyed my shirts this morning..and they have been in plastic bags for about 7hrs and they arent even close to being dry. i am not goin to rinse them out until tomorrow but or will they be dry enough by then? thanks

 

[iu97alum]

ok.,..i have a ? for u all
i dyed my shirts this morning..and they have been in plastic bags for about 7hrs and they arent even close to being dry. i am not goin to rinse them out until tomorrow but or will they be dry enough by then? thanks

You dot want thrm to dry. When you have let them soak long enough you will rinse them until the water runs clear. It will be a lot of dyr!

 

[momsoftwins]

ok i just dont want them to rum clear and nothing be left on the shirts..would hate to have a tie dyed shirt with no dye on it..

 

[quiltymom]

The hardest part of the whole process is waiting the 24 hours for the dye to set! If you followed the directions correctly then you shouldn't have a problem. Just know that there will be a lot of dye coming off of the shirts when your rinse them - it's to be expected. You'll want to run them through the wash before wearing them to remove the excess dyes. Good luck!