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Tie-Dyed Writing
The other night, my family and I set to work on a family project of tie-dying t-shirts. We laughed and had a grand 'ole time creating fascinating and cool designs. After each creation, we were thrilled and talked excitedly about opening our own new business (joking, of course). But then we washed the shirts. Upon pulling them from the washing machine, we found shirts that were no longer colorful and full of life. These were shirts that looked as if they had been washed with blue jeans instead and were accidentally stained bluish-yellow. Everyone was upset.

Herbal Dye Crafting
Herbal dyeing, is a craft that even prehistoric man used to imprint the history of his life.

In this week's column, we will give you a quick primer on growing herbal dye plants, the colors they produce, and of course, some instructions on making dyes.

We'll finish off with a couple ideas for craft projects so you can try out your new dye-making skills.


Tie One On!
Whether you hate ties (like both the reviewer and editor of this site) or love 'em, you can at least find some enjoyment out of them in this entertaining book that applies the concepts of mathematics to the various ways to tie a tie. Don't let that scare you off -- you don't need to like math to enjoy this book either!

Easy Tye Dye
For simplicity's sake, you could use one color per garment, but you can also use multiple colors. You can also use colored garments and use a contrasting dye color to achieve the some interesting results.

Kool-Aid Tye Dye T-Shirts
An easy way to tye-dye T-shirts Wonderful group project!

Craft Project - Shirt and Tie Clock
One of our coolest ideas for Father's Day, and much better than yet another tie Dad has to wear, this clock is surprisingly easy to make. It makes the perfect gift for Dad to bring to the office or hang in his study. Finally, something to do with that really ugly tie Dad has!


Cranberry Dye
Another natural dye that would make a great activity for the Thanksgiving holidays. Did you know that the Pilgrims actually didn’t wear black all the time? They were quite frugal and used any natural dye that they could, rather than purchase special dyes that would have been so expensive and almost impossible to come by in the early days. Cranberries make a bright red dye.

Purple Cabbage Dye
Here’s another very easy natural and homemade dye. There is a little odor while cooking cooking the cabbage to obtain the dye, but you can quickly dispurse this by opening a window. This makes a blue dye.

Marigold Dye
This is a fun homemade dye! Anytime you can grow marigolds is when you can make this dye. You can even make it in the middle of winter if you want to grow an indoor flower box of marigolds. The dye is a pretty yellow, but can be delicate in intensity if you pick the blooms too soon, or wait too late.

Spinach Dye
My son likes the idea of this one. He thinks the more spinach we use for dye, the less he will have to eat. Spinach makes a very pretty green dye.

To Dye or Not to Dye: That Is the Question
Natural color. The issue is what to dye for. Some kids use Kool-aid for that grape or raspberry look. That's not seemly for a Woman Of A Certain Age.

Walnut Shell Dye
I learned about this dye when I was a little girl. Not only is it used for dyeing fabrics and other textiles, you can use it to stain wood as well. Its also one of the least expensive if you live in an area where you can just pick up the walnuts off the ground. The color of this dye can change slightly from harvest season to harvest season depending on the health of the walnut tree and nuts. But it’s a pretty butternut kind of brown.

Tea Dye
This is another lovely dye that has a tan-ish color to it. This dye is used to “age” fabric and paper so that it has an antique look.

T-Shirt Quilt (Part I)
Do you have trouble throwing away old t-shirts that your child loves, even though the shirt doesn't fit them any more? Are there bags of old t-shirts in your storage that you just can't part with? Then make a personal treasure with those shirts.

Grape Juice Dye
This dye is probably no surprise to many of you. The grape stain is notorious on clothing and carpets. But it makes a fun and easy project for the kids. This dye is usually purplish in color but can run towards blue depending on the variety of grapes that you use.

Beet Dye
This is about the easiest of the natural red dyes to make. It only takes a couple of grocery store cans. This dye is reddish. The intensity of the red color will depend on the length of time you leave your fabric in the dye and the variety of beets used.

Batik Fabric
Batiking fabric is a craft that is probably older than tie-dying. We used this activity when studying ancient Africa, but you can also use if for other countries and as a project in the study of textiles and fabrics.

Onion Skin Dye
People have been dyeing materials for over 5,000 years. The earliest dyes all came from natural ingredients. This dye is yellow to brown in color, depending on the type of onion skins you use.

Blueberry Dye
This is a very pretty dye that comes out a kind of bluish-purple. I’ve found that different varieties of berries will yield slightly different shades of color. The color is also affected from year to year depending on the weather, ground nutrients, and the general health of the plants.

Coffee Dye
This is a nice rich, brown dye. Super easy to fix and even has a nice odor while the fabric is soaking.

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