All you need is a little bit of....

Conversing: "Joshua, you don't want to get yucky on your shirt." He replies "EWWWWW...YUCKY!!!"

a little bit of role play: "See Joshua. Watch Mommy put it on. See if Mommy spills something, it won't get on her shirt."

a little bit of trial & error: "See tuck it into your shirt." Then Joshua replied "NO! and then he yanked it out and threw it on the ground! So we opted to compromise with it lying around his collar. 

a little bit of patience (& a tad raise of the Mama-brows!): Joshua, it is your choice. You can choose to get down and not eat any applesauce or you can choose to put on the towel and eat your applesauce. 

And voila! He actually ate all of the applesauce with the towel on his shirt. Now this most likely will only impress my mom (maybe Chunk) lol. I was proud. He has hated burp clothes from day 1 and once he was strong enough, he pulled them off. Now, I do know Supernanny's "trick" would have worked (Put it on. He takes it off. Put it on again. He takes it off. Put it on again. He takes it off. Put it on again. He takes it off....eventually his determination will turn into boredom and voila, you win!). But I never really cared enough to do that.