Crochet Rug 2.0

So I started over with just the t-shirts and I'm much happier. My camera still sucks though. Oh well. I fix as much as I can but there's only so much you can do with a crappy shot.


It's so much thicker and wider and better. I'm 10 shirts into it here and I've got 10 more that I've pulled out to use. We'll see how far that gets me.


I'm most excited about that dark pink shirt there. The color doesn't exactly come out here, it's more vibrant than it looks in this picture.


The only part I'm displeased with is how big the holes are in that white section above the purple. I may cut a strip just to weave through there to fill it in. I'm not feeling that particular about being able to see the stitches here, I just want it to be squashy and comfy under my feet.

Crochet Rug Update

In a previous post I alluded to needing advice on the crochet rug. "Needing advice" - at least in knitting circles - is usually code for "I hate this now but I've spent so much time on it I can't bear to redo it and I'm so emotionally invested now I can't make a rational decision." I didn't really need advice, I needed to acknowledge that this simply wasn't going to be a perfect start to finish project.

You can see here how I started adding t-shirts to the end where I ran out of sheet. What's not completely apparent from the picture is how much thicker the t-shirt section is. I should have realized this before hand, although I cut the t-shirt strips to about the same width, the fabric is much thicker than the sheet. So the rug got much thicker in the t-shirt section than the sheet section. I stood on it several times to test, it was clear that was going to annoy me if I kept going this way.


What also started happening is the t-shirt rows were noticeably (to me) wider than the rest of it too. What to do? I loved making the part with the sheet so much cause it went so quickly and smoothly and it was my first real crochet project. But as I fixated on the thicker t-shirt section, I realized I liked that section better. The holes in the first part of the rug suddenly seemed so big and weird, I think the hook I'm using (size Q) was too big for that part.

So I tried think of ways to save it without undoing it, but deep down in my heart I knew what I needed to do. I just had to take the time to come to grips with it. I unraveled the t-shirts, vowed to figure out what to do with the sheet part later, then started again with an all t-shirt rug. I'm about 8 t-shirts into it (but no pictures yet) and I'm not sure I have enough shirts that I'm willing to cut up on hand to finish it, but I'll find them somewhere. I decided to make the whole thing wider too, I really want this baby to cover up some serious real estate on my gross linoleum kitchen floor. And I'm much happier with how it's progressing now. Pictures of Crochet Rug 2.0 to come. In the meantime, here's some gratuitous cat pictures.

Mindy is unimpressed with the whole thing.


But she does like the hook. It's too bad she doesn't have thumbs or she might have actually been able to get it. Mork is in the back marveling at how much my cheap little camera sucks. Why is the only part in focus that little bit way on the right side?


I have a cat named Mork. Mork has a cat named Mindy.

Almost finished before I even blogged about starting it

I didn't go to church today, a fact about which my grandmother had uncharacteristically non-passive, yet still aggressive, things to say. Instead of church, I listened to my heathen boyfriend play Phish bootlegs on the college radio station while I drank tea and started making this:


The sheet I'm using is a batik style print that I used to individualize my bland as bland can be comforter freshman year of college. Over the years it's gotten worn thin in places and the cats have clawed holes through it. So now I'm excited to give it a new life. I cut it into a long continuous strip about an inch and a half wide.


The rug is 20 stitches across and I'm just going to keep going till I think it's long enough. It's already more than twice as long now than it was this afternoon when I took these pictures. But my camera battery is low and I don't have any more lovely sunshine coming in my bedroom window so I may just wait to stage another photo shoot once it's done.


I think I'll have to cut more rag strips to get the length I'm looking for, not sure how that will look with so much of this patterned sheet. But I'll cross that bridge when I come to it, I do have a lot of t-shirts in colors that would look interesting striped on the end. Or I may expand it by doing denim around the edges. We'll see.

I'm pleased to have such a successful project to post about after the last post of failure. Happy Easter to all the other pagans out there! I had a lovely day despite the fact that I'm going to hell.

Want to make it, can't decide how

For a while I've wanted to make a t-shirt rug like this. I have this problem where I can't seem to live without at least four Old Navy Perfect Tees (currently I'm into the v-neck version) in my wardrobe at any given time. But as t-shirts are wont to do they stretch out over time and become unflattering to my figure. As I am wont to do I save the ones that don't fit. My mom sews a lot (well she did when I was little) and I used to make her remake my old clothes into other stuff, all hippy style. I've always wanted to be more crafty, but I've never really gotten into sewing. So I have just saved all these old t-shirts, meaning to repurpose them but not knowing how. Then I saw that rug idea and it was perfect. (I've been knitting for a little over two years.)

But then when I went searching for the knitted rug blog post to link to, I found this and this and now I think maybe I want to crochet it instead. I think I know how to crochet enough to pull it off (and if I don't, I already have this to help me) and the only new thing I'd have to buy is the fatty hook. I like the idea of crocheting such a heavy and thick project cause I feel like my wrists would start to hurt knitting it. And I can make it as wide as I want without having to buy a size 19, 46" circular.

B, if you're reading this, what do you think?