Should I Use Rit or Tulip Dye?

Remember when I posted about the kid's I nanny's halloween costumes? And how I talked about dying their clothes to make the costumes? I wrote about using two different brand of dyes. And now I'm finally getting around to reviewing them. I was not paid to use these products or write a review on them.

I've been a fan of Rit dyes ever since I can remember, since that's the kind my mom had always used. I went to the place I have always gotten Rit dyes at Hobby Lobby and they weren't there. So I thought they didn't carry them anymore so I just picked up the tulip brand. I later found out that Hobby Lobby keeps Tulip brand with the t-shirts and Rit brand with the fabric. Why can't they just get along and cohabitate?

I really liked Tulip for the ease of dying. There were a lot less steps before putting the fabric in. But there is a downside, they don't hold the dye very well and they don't have many color options. It took three rounds of dye to get the Tigger pants to look that orange, two of Tulip and one of Rit. It bothered me that they looked so much darker wet than they did dry.



















Rit dye has lots more options and varying shades of a few colors. It's a little bit more complicated of a process but it holds the dye a whole lot better. It does say on the box to leave it in for some amount of time or until you reach the color desired. Leave it in longer than the amount of time because when you rinse/wash it the first time A LOT of the color comes out. And that goes for both brands.

So even though I liked the process better for for Tulip brand I'm definitely going with Rit brand. Let me know if you have any questions and I'll do my best to answer them!

Halloween Costumes

I nanny the most adorable twins! And I used to nanny their older brother, until he decided to grow up and go to school. It's very uncool! And each halloween, I make their costumes! Last years costumes were pretty darn cute and I was nervous to top them this year.

Last year Coryn was an owl! Find the tutorial here. Cayle was Carl from Up! This is one I based it off of and the girl was so sweet, she said that if she hadn't of already lent it to a friend she would have sent me the walker she made. Cully was Doctor Who! This one was all me, I couldn't really find a tutorial. He was a mix of 10 and 11. I made the Tardis myself without any tutorial because no one had made one! It was super easy but lots of tedious work. I did use a picture to base it off of, the one I made is on the bottom.

This year I asked Cully for input one day on the way to his house. I asked him what he wanted to be, "Doctor Who, du-uh!" I was proud! Then I asked him what he thought his babies should be "Pooh Bear and Piglet sound good." And the wheels in my head started spinning out of control! Later, we convinced Cully to be Tigger. The kid had just given me gold! Now I'm not the best seamstress when it comes to clothes so I like to stay far away. Last years costumes required no sewing! Hot glue and buying but no sewing. This year I had to break down and sew a couple times. I like sewing though, just not clothes-there's too much pressure.

We'll talk about buckets at the end.

When I start costumes I like to look in their closets and see what we can take from there. We used a long sleeve pink shirt of hers and some pink shorts. We got the smallest youth size pink shirt and then had to tailor it, and it was still a little big in the sleeves so we just tied ribbons to it make it look better. I drew lines, that I wish would have been a little darker or wider in hindsight, using fabric paint and used a ruler to make them equal distance. We go pink tights, which she can wear again! And the cutest little pink shoes from Hobby Lobby (used my 40% off coupon on them too!)

Finding a plain yellow shirt for Cayle proved impossible. We didn't want anything printed on it in case it peeked through on the bottom. And finding yellow pants never happened. So we got some white girl tights, and a white shirt and died them using Tulip dye, I think the color was Sunshine. Then  I took the same size shirt that we got Coryn, different color of course, and cut off the bottom. I then used this font to print the iconic Pooh and then DIY screen print it. And I was so happy the yellows matched!

Can we just take a second to look at that adorable foot?

Cully's costume gave me the most headaches! I didn't find white pants until almost the 11th hour! And I was so grateful because I had no idea what I was going to do. We used Cintas white pants. I also had a white shirt for him. I dyed them together and the shirts took the color a lot better than the pants, in fact the pants were barely tinted while the shirt looked great! I used Tulip brand for the first dying and then they were out of the orange so I had to use Rit brand for the second dye. I didn't take a picture of what they looked like the first time but the shirt after the first dye was pretty close to what the pants looked like after the second dye and I wished I wouldn't have put the shirt in for the second dye but I was nervous. Then I used black fabric actual paint, not the one in a tube that you draw with, to paint on the stripes. FYI that kind has sparkles in it, not a lot-but enough that you might want to hurt someone if you find out at midnight two days before this has to be ready. I used some yellow fabric I found in the remnants section at Hobby Lobby to make the stomach. I just traced a serving dish so that I could get a good oval. I wish I would have made it a little smaller but it looks great! I doubled up on the yellow so it would show a true yellow and not an orange yellow.
Then there was the whole ordeal about the Tigger tail. So I was not smart and decided to wait til the last night to make it. And then the sewing machine broke! So I had to go to church super early and use the church sewing machines to sew the tail and then it was too big and Cully only wore it for just a few minutes.

As for the buckets-

We used the ugly $1 buckets from Walmart and covered them. I used grosgrain ribbon in a matching color to cover the handle.
For coryn's we used full price purple fleece and used fabric paint to draw lines on them, and then cut them into strips. Then wrapped and glued them. I used three strips, and I want to say they were like 2.5 in wide.
Cayle's I used two different remnant fabrics. Why do I love remnant fabrics? They're deeply discounted leftovers! I used a light brown for the bottom and a green and white polka dot on top. The easiest way to make it is to just make a circle and slip it over. It'll be tight and the very bottom will pucker a little bit but as you can see-you couldn't even tell and it was super cute!
Cully I used black remnant and full price orange, the same stuff I used for his tail. I did it the same way I did Cayle's and then painted stripes on it.

If you have any questions, just let me know!

* Update - The reason they're wearing Mickey Mouse hats is because they did Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween and we had them wear those hats instead of making them hats because trying to find child-size basebeall caps for less than an arm is ridiculous!

Last Minute Father's Day Gift Ideas

I went all out for Mother's day, at least with my primary class. For one reason or another most of my class don't really get to do much for their moms for Mother's day and that's where I enter! We did 3 super easy crafts/gifts to moms.

My favorite one is the one I used last year too. You can never go wrong with a goodie bag of chocolate. I got a pack of like 50 clear cellophane bags from Hobby Lobby for less than 2 dollars, and spent a small fortune on Hershey kisses but it was worth it! But just like last year I forgot to buy hugs, which is totally okay because no one really cared.

via Little LDS Ideas
*I linked to her page with Mother's Day ideas
so just scroll down a post or two

My dad travels A LOT for work, I mean like 9 months out of the year. So we tend to accumulate a lot of hotel soap, and to please my mother I decided to help her get rid of some. I used another idea from Little LDS Ideas and this one was the kids favorite for some reason. (I think it might be due to the double sided tape I had them use) Since the soap was small I had them tape two together and then tape the tag to the top. This one doesn't have a pdf to use, so I just put it in a word document and printed 6 to a page.

via Little LDS Ideas
*I linked to her page with Mother's Day ideas
so just scroll down a post or two

And then because I wanted the kids to do a craft we made our mom's a napkin ring. This one didn't turn out so well, but the kids in my class have a VERY short attention span. There's no template, so I just googled flower coloring sheet and picked one. 

via Moms and Munchkins

I started planning for Father's day around the same time I was planning a Carnival Birthday party for the twin's second birthday, and at that point I was already ready to just mail it in and maybe it's just me but I don't feel like dads appreciate all the work I would do. 

The night before the party I entered a Target about 20 minutes before they closed and while I was booking it across the store I saw these coupons to give to dad. It's just a little pad of paper that has a magnet on the back to stick on the fridge, you can fill in on the coupon what it is good for. I would post a picture but I can't find mine (read: I'm too lazy to go upstairs and look for it) and I can't find it on their website. But I digress, the kids are going to give their dad's five coupons and decorate an envelope. And if you don't want to go buy the coupons, just have the kids design them or find a cute one on pinterest like this one from Disney Family. 

But I couldn't resist a craft, and since the last one didn't go so well with my primary class, I'm doing this one for them. I'm using this tutorial from Creative Family Moments. This one does require some planning, I took the pictures a couple weeks ago without really remembering what they were supposed to be doing, so mine don't look as cool. but once I'm done with them I'll post a picture for y'all to see! 

via Creative Family Moments

If you're looking for a REALLY simple one, then make a tie! It was a big hit with my brothers and I growing up. Just find a template online, I used this one from Activity Village (which is based in the UK, love them even more!), and just pasted it into word so I could print two to a page. I cut them in half, let them color up a storm and then cut them out. This one doesn't have a flap to fold over to hold the string, there's a dotted line at the bottom of the "knot" but don't fold it there, so I just left an inch above the "knot" when I cut and folded that over. Before you glue it down, we used tape so it would hold faster, put yarn or string underneath so they can wear it around their neck. The cub scouts that I work with loved it! Each member of our bishopric will be getting their very own handmade tie from Pack 203 this Sunday!

What are some of your favorite ideas for Father's Day or even Mother's Day?