2008-01-20

Creative Recycling

This is all that's left of 15+ of my favorite T-shirts.
My T-shirt quilt is still in the same un-finished state that it was in this post, (I hope to attend to it at our guild retreat next month), but what do you do with all the parts of the t-shirt that aren't good enough to go into the quilt?
Crochet them into a rug, of course. I followed a link from someone's blog a few months back about crocheting old clothing into rugs and had the brilliant idea to try it. Of course now I can't find the link or the blog I read it in, but hey, it was a really good idea!!
First you cut up your t-shirt into a continuous 1" wide strip, then roll it into a ball so it's easy to work with. (the light green one above used to be an ultra-comfy Comme Ca du Mode long sleeved pajama tee that I got at a thrift shop in Hokkaido.. the red one below had the sad fate of being worn by my sister when she decided to dye her hair..)
Then crochet away! I started with back and forth rows to make a long rectangle, then went around a bit and added longer stitches in places to make it more oval. The hook is a size Q. My cousin Amanda came to visit this weekend and took over the stitching, bringing it to it's current size and shape. It would be nice if it were 3-6 rows bigger, but we ran out of t-shirts. I started the project with her in mind so she will take it back for her dorm room, adding to it if she wants to, and I will have the satisfaction of knowing that my beloved t-shirts have found a new functional purpose.

3 comments:

PJ said...

What a wonderful idea!!!!! I just tossed one of my beloved green t-shirts in the bag to throw away because of holes under the arms...I should crochet it up and forever have it!!!! Thank you for this idea!

Amanda Jean said...

hey, I am working on one of those rag rugs right now! Aren't they just so satisfying to make?!?! I finished one last summer. there is a photo of it on this post:

http://crazymomquilts.blogspot.com/2007/07/downs-and-ups.html

if you ever come across the original link you found about making rag rugs, would you post it? I'd love to see it!

Danetta said...

I came here from amandajean's blog. I love this! Thanks for the instruction.

Related Posts with Thumbnails