Infinity Ombre Scarf

UPDATED 12-5-2011

Last Thursday, Erica from the block and I got busy with dye and some white tees after I came across a post on the a bit of sunshine blog. I’ve been trying to remember what exactly I was Googling at the time I came across Rebekah’s blog and these fantastic scarves but I don’t remember. I am chalking it up to divine intervention.

What you need:

• Dye – either powder and liquid dyes work
• Salt for the dye bath
• T-shirts – XL size, or larger –  We found that the white undershirts stretch much better than regular white shirts. Our shirts are Fruit of the Loom.
• Rubber gloves, bucket

Trim the shirt. Cut off the bottom hem and cut a line from arm pit to arm pit, right below the seam.

Prep the dye bath according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

Drop the wetted shirt into the dye. We divided the scarves into three sections. The bottom section was under for about 20 minutes, the middle and bottom for another 18 minutes and the whole shirt, including the top section, just 5 minutes or so.

In our big batch of scarves, we used the following times:

First third – 30 minutes

First and second third – 15 minutes

Whole scarf – 3 minutes

Once the scarf has all been dyed, rinse in cold water until the water runs clear. Do remember rubber gloves or you will have to use gallon bags like we did. Classy.

To complete the dying process, the material needs to cycle through the washer and dryer to remove the excess dye. However, there are a couple options for the step right before the final wash and we tried them all.

One batch we dried in the dryer before the final wash and dry. One batch was laid in the sun for a while before washing and drying. And after the final rinse with the last batch, we washed and dried it right away. They all ended up with similar color variation so decide what works best for you.

After the scarves have been dried, s-t-r-e-t-c-h them out. We found an effective pose: slip one end under your feet and hook the other end in the your palms and pull apart.

That’s it!

I hoped to show how the scarves hung in the pictures below but I am sad that the color variation isn’t as apparent.

Like those flowers? I sure do. They were the stars of the sneak peak picture on Saturday.

In the ‘waste not’ vein, Erica and I used the left-over t-shirt material to make flowers, also from Rebekah’s blog, found here.

UPDATE 12-5-2011

Here is another t-shirt flower that may tickle your fancy. Tutorial found here.

Love Bug is very into them too, the scarves and the flowers.

Happy Monday!

Take care.

-amy c
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