Tuesday, March 27, 2012

March's Rag Rug {Using t-shirts, sweatshirts and a hula hoop}

 For the month of March (in my goal of sharing a rag rug each month) I thought I would tell you about some "Hula Hoop" rugs that we made. I first got the idea for this circular weaving when a friend said that she had taken a class where they made them using bicycle tire frames for their "loom". I started thinking about how she said they did it and figured that a hula hoop would be bigger and maybe easier to come by anyway. Then I googled that idea and found that it wasn't original with me. Family Fun has a whole tutorial on how to make a "hula hoop rug". Then I was able to barter for a hula hoop and we got busy making some.
 Even Megan was able to help with this rug which she thought was quite a lot of fun.
 Jonathan helped with the weaving too. On this first rug we did make the mistake of pulling our strands to tightly and we ended up with a rather bowl shaped rug (which I gave to my mom and she is using as a chair mat in her red, white and blue room) but we learned our lesson and the rugs after that lay nice and flat.
These rugs are very fast to make and when you use thick strips of sweatshirt material they are thick and comfy too! The main drawback is that when I washed one of the rugs some of the strands got pulled a bit out of shape. I was able to get it looking good again with just a little tugging here and there but I don't think they are the sturdiest rug nor the best one for washing.

Here is the link for the tutorial.

Have you made rag rugs? What sort do you like to make? Have you ever made one like this?

5 comments:

Hallie said...

We actually just got our tshirts and hoola hoops to start working on one! Glad ot see they actually turn out! Thanks for sharing! :)

Anna said...

I like the rug's look, to bad you can't make it any bigger.

Sally said...

I like it! It's big enough for here they put their feet down out of the bed, or right at a chair! I am pinning this on Pinterest to remember this as a handicraft for the children!

Sally said...

Oh, but i am wondering if you could tape flexible tubing of a greater diameter to make a larger rug?

Abbi said...

Sally and Anna - You could make a bigger rug if you had a bigger hoop and I think your idea would work Sally as long as the hoop was rigid. It would have to be able to hold its shape. My dad mentioned that he could make a big metal hoop for me but we haven't pursued that yet.

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