Today’s entry is featuring our July 4th here in the Ft. Polk area. We’ve lived here now for 2 years and for the last two years, we didn’t do much of anything festive. I blame a whole lot of things, but mostly the idea of keeping all three kiddos up super late for fireworks was never very appealing (at least while they’re super little). This year, however, I told Charley (the hubster) that it was worth a try.

In honor of my new found excitement in the 4th of July festivities, I decided to also tackle a tie-dye project. I found this idea on Pinterest…(where else?!), purchase the shirts and tie-dye kit at Hobby Lobby (although they have them at Walmart, too), and convinced my neighbor to join me.

The link to the project provided pretty good step by step instructions. Here are the little things we noticed along the way…

• It’s more time consuming than you’d think to rubber band 4 shirts!
• Perhaps, rubber band them the night before instead of announcing to the kids, “It’s time for our tie-dye project!” and then sit there for the next hour doing four shirts per family!
• The rubber bands that come with the kit are a little too thick and hard to stretch. They may work on the main part of the shirt, but they are too much for the stars in the blue section. Buy some regular ones 🙂
• The teeny tiny rubber bands you can find for little girls’ hair are perfect for the stars!
• Be sure to use 100% cotton shirts, it absorbs the dye MUCH faster and you won’t sit there in the backyard with the sun beating down on you as you try to coax the fabric to cooperate (my tank top).
• The link says to put the rubber bands for the stars on the front and back. We did just that, but added WAAAAY more than she shows in the original link. I like the way ours turned out with the extra stars 🙂
• When rinsing your shirts, don’t take the rubber bands off. I took mine off first and then went to rinse them. Not the brightest crayon in the box, I’m afraid. Anyway, it made it a bit more difficult because I had to hold each section out of the way so the color didn’t bleed and make purple shirts 🙂 If you do take off the rubber bands first, it’s not the end of the world, but it’s easier if you leave them on.

So, there you have it. My little run down of tips should you wish to try this project! Below are ours after they had been washed and dried. Then the boys wearing them, and me trying to get a photo with all of them, which as I mentioned in my Instagram picture, became a blooper reel moment. Sigh.

And here we are on our way to Freedom Fest on Ft. Polk. The boys enjoyed their first Lynyrd Skynyrd concert and the twins experienced fireworks for the first time. Of course, our shirts made everything better. 🙂

I hope your 4th was a fabulous one! I’d love to know what special things you did with your family! Be sure to comment below! 🙂

~Melissa