Ice Dyed Scrunchies

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We are at week 3 of the 9 weeks of Summer Camp Craft Saturdays. So far we have done friendship bracelets, and painted rocks. One of the camp crafts I wanted to be sure to include in this series was tie dye. But since I have a few tie dye projects on my blog already, I kind of wanted to try something I hadn't done before. 

I have been seeing ice dye all over lately and I thought it looked pretty cool so I decided to give it a try. I also kind of wanted to do something other than t-shirts, so I ended up deciding on scrunchies. I bought a big pack of plain white cotton scrunchies on Amazon and my Walmart had a bunch of their tie dye kits on clearance so I grabbed a couple of those too. One of them even happened to specifically be an ice dye kit so it came with a rack to dye on and everything. 

I did a test run to see how it would go and I made a shirt and a few scrunchies and they turned out pretty cool. The thing that is kind of fun with ice dye is I feel like it is a lot more random than regular tie dye. I mean, you never really know how your tie dye project is going to turn out until you open it up and wash and dry it, but ice dye takes that to another level in my opinion. You can kind of control where you put the dye powder, but really, when it comes down to it you can't control how the ice melts, and where it drips, and how the dye spreads. It is a big surprise when it is done. 

It also has more of a watercolor wash type of effect. The blending and splotching of the colors is really fun. On a couple of my scrunchies I feel like I mixed a few too many colors and they got a little muddy, but it was still a lot of fun to see how each one turned out. Some were super saturated with color, some had only small spots of color. 

I think this is a really fun twist on tie dye, whether you are making scrunchies like I did, t-shirts, or something else, it is definitely worth a try. 

How to Ice Dye Scrunchies

You will need:

• white cotton scrunchies (or other white fabric items that are made of natural fibers)
• rack to place items on for dying
• tie dye powder
• gloves
• bucket or container to hold your rack
• ice

Instructions:

The first thing you will want to do is set up your dying station. 

Place the rack over a bucket or tray to catch the melting ice and dye. You may also want to cover the area with a plastic tablecloth, or do this project outside because it could definitely get messy. 

I used the rack that came in my ice dye kit but you could also use something like a cooling rack for baking or a dish rack. You want something that will lift the fabric up off off the surface while still allowing the water and dye to drip through as the ice melts. 

Then you will want to have some kind of tray or bucket that the rack is sitting in so that the liquid that drips down stays contained in something, otherwise you will have a big mess on on your hands. I used a plastic tray that I had in my craft room, and propped the tray up inside on a piece of plastic from my tie dye package so that the liquid could drain around it. 

Once you have you work space set up you are ready to prep your items to dye. 

You can dye your items either dry or damp. I did all of mine dry. If you dye them dry the colors will be a little more intense and splotchy, if you dye your items damp they will blend more and be a little more muted. Whichever way you choose is fine, it just depends on which look you are going. You could even try some of each to see which you prefer. 

Take your items and fold them however you want, then rubber band them to hold them in place. This is more important when you are doing larger items like shirts because the way you fold it can give you more of a design. With the small size and shape of the scrunchies it doesn't matter as much but I still scrunched and rubber banded them just to hold them tight and separate on the rack. 

Place the rubber banded items on the rack.

Now you have another option. If you are using lighter colors you can choose to sprinkle some dye powder on the fabric before putting the ice down, other wise move on to the step of putting ice on your project. 

Cover the top of your fabric with ice cubes. Make sure everything is covered with ice. 

Sprinkle dye powder all over the ice. You can mix all of the colors over the whole surface, or you try to sprinkle certain colors over certain areas of the ice. 

Once the ice is covered with dye let it sit while the ice melts. If you check and there are areas where the ice has melted and there is still dry powder clumps you can add more ice to that area to mix with the dye. 

When all the ice has melted wash and dry your items in a separate load to see how they turn out.