Saturday, June 4, 2011

Our Splendid Napkins

A little over a year ago we made the decission to switch from paper napkins to cloth.  We picked up a couple of packages of white dinner napkins from Williams-Sonoma (thanks to Dave's discount there) and have never looked back.  It has been a great change and I wish we had done it sooner!  We also purchased some napkin rings from an artisan on Etsy so that we could easily tell whose napkin was whose thus allowing each one to be used more than once.  

In an effort to make telling the napkins apart even easier (in addition to hiding the stains that some of the napkins had) we decided to tie dye them!  Earlier this week, the girls and I headed to the craft store where we picked up a super easy tie dye kit and we got to work.  They would choose a pattern from the direction sheet, I would put the rubber bands on the napkins and then the girls worked their magic. 
We ended up letting them sit for just about 48 hours before we removed the rubber bands to reveal how they came out.  The results were far more fabulous than we could have ever imagined! 
Grace is holding the peace flag that we tie dyed (before further decorating) to send to our friends the heart rockin' family!  It will be going in the mail on Monday!
Ever since I posted these pictures on Facebook we have gotten so many compliments on how the napkins turned out!  I really can't take much credit as all I did was band them. It truly was the girls doing!  They did a great job, truly enjoyed it, and had a blast opening each one up!  The other question I have been asked is how we got them to be so vibrant. Aside from turning an almost five year old and an almost three and half year old loose on them, we also used the dye as soon as it was mixed up, and we let them sit for almost 48 hours. The directions told us that the longer they were allowed to sit the brighter the colors would be, and clearly that seems to have been the case!  It had not been my intention that they would have sat that long, but I sure am glad that is what ended up happening! 
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5 comments:

  1. Unschoolers Rock the CampgroundJune 5, 2011 at 9:40 AM

    I am absolutely inspired to make some, too! Cannot wait to see the flag! Thank You :)

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  2. UnknownJune 5, 2011 at 4:03 PM

    these are brilliant...what a fun activity

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  3. ShelJune 7, 2011 at 7:15 AM

    Thanks, girls! It really was so much fun and way easier than I expected it to be! Although I have to say that even with smocks on (and a garbage bag to lay the dyed cloths on we still got super messy (which we love)! It came out easily enough, just required a wee bit of scrubbing during bath time!

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  4. LJS June 7, 2011 at 8:43 AM

    I adore the picture of your napkins lined up across your yard. That is a work of art! We use cloth napkins too but I have never thought to give each of us our own napkin ring! That will have to be a project for us to do soon!

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  5. ShelJune 9, 2011 at 1:59 PM

    Jessica, Thank you so much for your sweet words! We were so impressed with how they turned out! I loved having them hanging on the clothsline and almost didn't want to take them down! The napkin rings definitely help too!

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