Adventures in Tie-Dye

What can I say about tie-dye? It is one of the most beloved and cherished activities that can happen at any camp. Camp Wood is no exception. So I knew what I was getting into when I accepted the position as Arts and Crafts Director my second summer there. At least I thought I knew what I was getting into.

I honestly thought the tie-dye part of arts and crafts was going to be easy. Mix the dye for the week, give the kids some rubber bands, and let them go to town. I had seen Katarina do it many times the previous summer. How hard could it be, right? Little did I know it meant stained hands, smelly water, and the dying of things that should not have been dyed.

One of the most memorable events that happened while I was Arts and Crafts Director happened when there were not even campers at on the property. We received a call that the valley was going to be flooded and that we would need to get the campers into town now or else they would be stuck at camp all weekend.

What proceeded was a mad scramble to get all the campers packed and down the hill into town as quickly as possible. I abandoned my post and helped pack the campers. Then I packed my car because I was going to be gone for the weekend. The buckets of dye in the crafts cabin were the last things on my mind.

We got all the campers delivered to their parents and I had a great weekend. When I returned to Camp on Sunday, I decided it was a good time to go mix the dye so it would be ready for the week. I unlocked the cabin, walked in, and immediately noticed the buckets were still full from the week before. I grabbed the buckets and took them outside one by one to empty them.

The last bucket was the bucket of blue dye. As I grabbed its handle, I noticed what appeared to be a pair of socks floating in the dye. Were they blue! My first thought was to reach in there and pull them out, but then I remembered that I hate touching wet slimy things. I had to come up with another plan.

The plan was simple. I would take the bucket outside and dump it. The socks would float out and I would just leave them in the sun until they dried, at which point I would pick them up and throw them away. Brilliant!

The plan went smoothly until the socks floated out and I realized they were not socks at all. A pair of mice had fallen into the bucket, drowned, and dyed bright blue! We got them disposed of and I never again forgot to dump the buckets before the weekend.