Lawn Mowing Tie Dye T-Shirt

Create a special Father's Day T-Shirt for Dad! Make dad a new lawn mowing T-shirt that will make all the other dad's jealous.

You will need to go shopping for:

Green One Step Dye from Tulip. It comes with a handy bottle.

1 White Cotton T-shirt

Gloves

Rubber Bands

Black Fabric Marker

News Paper

Hair Dryer

If using Soda Ash (Soda Ash is supposed to help the dye be more vivid):

1 gallon bucket, 2 tablespoons of Soda Ash, 2 cups of water

Prewash and dry your white cotton shirt.

Fold the shirt into a vertical accordion fold.

Tie a rubber band on each end and then one in the middle.

Add more rubber bands as you like going up and down the t-shirt to at least 3/4 up.

You will not be dying the chest to neck portion.

This step is actually optional but if you do use soda ash it should help the colors be more vivid.

To prepare your shirt, first put on your gloves

Put two cups of hot water in your bucket and then dump in the 2 table spoons of soda ash. Stir to dissolve.

Put your T-shirt in the mix for 15 minutes.

Wring out (while wearing gloves) and move to prep area for dye.

Add water to your one step dye bottle.

There will be a black line on the bottle indicating where to fill it.

Shake the mix and immediately apply it to the shirt.

Add dye only to the portions below the chest area that are tied.

Make sure it's nice and saturated on all sides of the shirt.

You can leave the top portion white or add a crumpled dye look. To do the crumpled look, dilute the remaining dye with water. Crumple up all the white portion of the shirt, tie it with rubber bands and drip diluted die randomly.

Wrap your dyed shirt in a plastic bag.

Now we wait. You can wait as little as 2 hours or as long as 24 hours. The longer it rests the more vivid your color will be.

After your shirt has set, rise well. (leave the rubber bands on).

Rinse until it runs clear or almost runs clear.

Take off rubber bands.

Wash your freshly dyed shirt with dark colors on a hot cycle, then throw it in the dryer.

Time to get artistic.

After your shirt is completely dry, place a piece of cardboard in between the layers of the shirt.

At the top of the green edge of your tie dye, take your black fabric marker and draw a stick man pushing a lawnmower. Repeat this process on the back.

If you need, practice drawing the image on scrap paper until you get it the way you want it and then redraw on the shirt.

I used a blow dryer to help set the ink since fabric markers take a while to dry and can bleed.

Wash and Dry again.

Then you are ready to give dad his new lawn mowing shirt!