My first attempt at Tie Dye

Tie Dye’s been something I’ve wanted to try for years, but never have. I usually hesitate to start new hobbies, you know? Not only do I not need more things to occupy my time, but I also hardly need more supplies to store, right? But I’ve wanted to get a screenprint kit for a while, and I always browse at Dharma Trading Company and dream of the possibilities. And then many friends and fellow bloggers have written or spoken about tie dye lately, and Dharma sells a tie dye kit, and one thing led to another and before I knew it, um, I had a bunch of clothing blanks and dyes and goodies in my cart.

My first attempt was NOT bad, and it was definitely a learning experience.

This one on the left turned out quite nicely, though I anticipated the middle being a lighter green. Too much Dark Blue, overwhelmed the yellow, to make a dark green rather than the grassy green I envisioned.  The one on the right, I like. Your typical bulls-eye tie dye pattern. The colors didn’t mix together as much as I thought they would. (like, I thought it would be orange there in the second ring, not yellow and red.)

This swirl turned out way better than I anticipated. The hankie was hardly bulky and I had a hard time getting the rubber bands tight enough, so the whole thing was kind of floppy while I was dying it. Turned out nice, though. The one on the right is supposed to be Shibori, but it’s, uh, not very good. I like how it turned out, but it’s completely not what it should look like…

I love this one.

This is a little outfit. I like how it looks, but this was a good lesson for me. The green totally overwhelmed the yellow. I really wanted these to be mostly yellow, but put on too much green and blue, which, being darker, completely overwhelmed it.

So I want to combine batik and tie dye. I was having trouble getting the wax hot enough and I was doing this at home alone with Wally, so was reluctant to get out the hot plate to keep it warm at my table like I should probably do. I gave up on the wax and used Elmer’s gel glue, which I’d read about online. My mistake was, I’m pretty sure, I put the glue on the piece AFTER I soaked it in the soda ash solution. It kind of spread/ran more than I really thought it would. The octopus image is totally muddy. But the idea, in general, is not a bad one. If the lines could have been crisper, I would be happier, but it was a good first try with this. I’m not unhappy with it.

So these are all for me. Next time, I hope to be making stuff for the shop. I don’t plan to offer just tie-dyed items, I’ll be doing various things with the items to make them a bit more interesting.