How Knot to Crochet a Rug

Crocheted rugs are beautiful. We love a good crocheted rug. What we don't love about them, is the price of materials. How are you supposed to come up with a reasonably priced creation when you have to double your material to make them? Regular yarn isn't durable enough for something that you will walk on and need to occasionally clean. You would have to double and or triple up strands in order to make it.

I saw this pattern in passing that I have just been pining over. (Yes, that is a picture of a magazine. That is how I store information I want later!) It's been a long time since the last rug episode, long enough to forget the pain and the torture of making the stinky sisal rug. Not long enough to remember why buying the proper materials is important and something to save for. Seriously,  a good rug will cost about $60 in materials alone. After scouring the internet for some kind of cheaper material, I decided to go do some local shopping. We went to Big Lots, cause they usually have cheap rope. But it was still the same price as I saw online. Then I decided to go to Harbor Freight Tools. They have all sorts of weird stuff, surely they would have a spool of suitable material.

Ohhhhhh boy did they ever! All I saw was $15.99 for 600 ft and I was sold. It was shiny, it was bright, it was bold... how perfect! Mmmmmhmmmm... my husband even asked, "Honey, are you SURE you have to have it now?" I, in my crocheted rug crazed state of mind, responded, "Well, I've been bored and I really want to make this rug." There were some other great lines out of his smart alec mouth about being bored and finding stuff to do, but whatever. This is about the rug, not how witty my husband is.

I got out of the store and texted D a picture of my giant spool of rope:

When I got home, I eagerly started working on my masterpiece. Though not overly pliable, this definitely crocheted up better than the sisal. It was a bit sticky on the giant plastic hook if I didn't give myself enough room to get through my stitches. The rug took shape rather quickly, in my opinion. It just wasn't as solid of crochet as I was expecting, because it didn't have a lot of give. It was more loopy. It was still turning out rather cute and shaping up nicely. I left off at row seven with a very nasty blister and a pair of gloves that were being eaten alive by the material. This was probably not one of my better ideas. Being the plastic, there wasn't really a way to soak it into submission. It was just going to be rather springy and uncooperative. (Although, still more cooperative than the horrible sisal.)

It required a great amount of effort to get it to lay flat. I was beginning to wonder what I was going to do with this thing. As I walked on it to spread it out, I realized that I had made the perfect barn doily. Seriously, I can see it imprinted in the dirt by the door to wipe boots off on. It's just right and there are many levels of texture. It's really cute for an outdoor rug, but there are some definite raised spots where it just couldn't help itself... it was like trying to keep unruly hair in a ponytail.

I called it quits after row eight. It was large enough in diameter to pass as a decent rug to go in front of a door. My knuckle was still angry over the rough treatment and it was just obvious to me that any larger and it would be obnoxious. I had to come up with a way to stretch it completely out and kind of block it. I figured that getting it wet and letting it sit out in the sun should make it stay a bit better. I asked my husband for a way to block it. I was thinking of a sheet of plywood, some nails or screws and propping it up against a wall outside. He was thinking accessible objects. This is what happens when you ask a man for assistance in blocking:

He did very generously loan me the use of his BBQ. I have yet to know if it will be adequately stretched out. But I do know that I intend to have it available in our booths this next season. It's bright and cheerful. I can't wait to see what it looks like without the chairs, planter and BBQ. Durable: check. Cute: check. Totally impractical for the original pattern of the rug: most definitely. We really have poor luck in choosing inexpensive, accessible rug materials. No wonder those things cost so much! By the time that we get around to use the proper materials, we may have enough ways NOT to make a rug to write a book. For now, you get a blog and someone gets a very cute, durable barn doily with which to wipe their boots!

Knot Worth It, or Is It?

So as I wrote this Tori was out yard sale-ing and found a really great deal on a bunch of yarn. I just might have yarn envy!! I can't wait to see what she found, and boy I hope there are no knots in this find...

I told a certain *ahem* someone that since her hubby is working all weekend, she should come into Bend and stay at her mom's just down the road! Then she could have gone with me! I found a listing on Craigslist for an estate sale out in Sisters. I couldn't give up hope that there would be some awesome yarn left by the time I got out there. Boy howdy! A bit of yarn was an understatement! There was tons. Erring on the side of caution, I filled up a bag with yarn, unsure of how much this lady was going to ask for my find. It was a large shopping bag jam packed full! 

 Don't let the packaging fool you! Once I got home and dumped out that lovely bag, there was yarn everywhere!!!! I had to reorganize my desk space, because apparently I already had a significant yarn collection. 

 There is a lot of amazing stuff in this pile! I was so thrilled when the lady accepted my offer of $20. We could not get home from Sisters fast enough after that! I kept pulling stuff out to take pictures and text Danielle.

Knots you ask? As Tori was just starting to pick up steam and really start to enjoy crocheting, I let her in on my secret place to find cheap yarn. She went and reported back that she found some great stuff and this giant knot of nice soft yarn.

 Someone mentioned that since it's only a three dollar thing of yarn, I should throw it out. I wanted to, really, I did. But there's a miserly cheapskate in me that just couldn't stand to throw away this pile of yarn I bought for a buck. When you start getting to the end of the month and have exhausted your yarn budget, it's comforting to know that pile is there. While spending hours the other day trying to reclaim this amazing pile of knots, I decided that it just cannot be worth it to try to spend my time un-knotting it. The unfortunate part is, I really liked the color and it IS shiny yarn. I was working with some other colors that were shiny and felt it was important to use it. I've been sectioning it off and balling what I can get out of it. I guess with my yarn purchase today, I can actually afford to throw that knotted piece away!(Well, I was actually considering cutting it up and leaving it in a convenient place for the birdies to pick it up to make nests out of.)

Well shortly after the whole purchase of the knot came the adventure of Agave yarn (aka sisle twine). I had this great idea that it would make a killer rug! Soo I spent an afternoon starting this "rug" at Tori's house, hours went by and all I had was this nice little round thing and very sore hands. When it was time for me to head on home I left it sitting in the middle of the floor in mild disgust.

Well you would think that the whole rug adventure would end with me dumping this project on my friend, Oh no it gets even better!

I looked at that twine every day, thinking that it couldn't/shouldn't be that difficult. It IS that difficult. And then some. It's like arm wrestling without the pleasure of winning. I was sore from hooking that god awful stuff! I started a different rug thinking it would be easier. It wasn't. Then I decided to soak the twine.... surely it would be softer and easier to use. I even used Crisco on my hook. Really. 

The twine soaked in the water for the entire time that I worked on that rug. It smelled like a farm. Seriously, it was disgusting. Someone... told me that it was just a little rug and if I gave up, I'd be letting it win. I was determined to see this project end. I worked and worked on it. The middle of my palm was bruised from shoving the hook in and out of the twine. When I finally got to the end, I had just enough time to block it before a bazaar. When I brought it in to the bazaar, I practically threw it at Danielle. I was so sick and tired of seeing and smelling that disaster! 

She was pretty sure that she needed to take it home. I warned her about the smelliness of this great rug, but she didn't seem to think there was a problem. Not until it had baked in her husband's work truck for days.  

Oh and how it stunk!! He was convinced that one of the many farm animals that we have crawled into his truck and died! It didn't take long before he found this dandy of a rug and threw it out into the yard. Yes is I did promptly retrieve the rug from the yard and moved it into his office.... LOL.\

That rug has not been seen since.... but the smelly rug saga has continued....