Rag Rug Tutorial!

This is rather time consuming and made my hands hurt like hell, but I found the end  result to be so cute that I'm almost finished with a second one and have plans and lots of scraps saved for a third, huge one.  This was no-sew, which I love, and a great way to bust scraps or use fabric that you have no clue what else to use for.

The first thing you will need is something like this:

 This is a open-weave knit jacket-thing I found at a thrift store for on the cheap.  I'd bought it to wear, but it was a bit tight and just really didn't look so cute on, so I decided to re-purpose it.  I cut the sleeves off and used the body of it, flattened out, for my base.  I used garbage bag ties to wire bits of it together where it had been cut into slits on the side to sit better on a body.  You could also use a small weave net, a latch hook base, basically anything you can find with lots of small holes.  It doesn't matter what it looks like because you won't see it.

 Secondly, you'll need scraps.  Lots and lots of scraps in whatever coordinating themes and colors you decide on.  When you think you have enough, trust me, keep cutting.

I made mine 6" long since I wanted a shaggy rug and they range from 1.5" to 2" wide.  I just used this plastic ruler and cut a long strip 6" wide then eyeballed the width as I chopped it up.

Once you're ready to tackle this thing, take your scraps and fold them in half like this.

Loop them through the holes...

Then pull their tails through the loop and tighten.  I found out on my second rug, you can just loop one end through a hole and tie it and it will come out just as fluffy, so really its up to you...Just whatever you find easier.

Keep going.  At this point, it may look a bit scroungy and you may wonder whether or not you're wasting your time, but you're not, just keep at it.

End result?

Cute and fluffy.  This is just a small rug I made for the knee-hole under hubs computer desk to keep his toesies warm.  The second one I'm almost done with is much bigger and a different color and I will post it and my huge one when I finish them.

Here's a close-up so you can see how shaggy it is and how nice the colors blend from up close:

On this rug, as well as the second, I cut up one color of fabric at a time and just went round and round in circles with them and that's how I got the odd, stripe-y look.  For the big mama I'll be doing a jumble, hodge-podge and I think it will look wicked cool.

These are easy, fluffy, and they feel soooo good on your toes, especially the second one as I used satin in it as well as other fabrics.  They are time consuming, though, so just find a good tv show with LOTS of seasons on Netflix!  Happy knoting!

<3

Wookie Wifey