Weft and Warp
Senior Member
There's a thread on the main page about being "green" which caused many of us to reminisce about the days when we used to return bottles for their deposit and also what we used to do with the paper bags--- and even about recycling in general.
-- http://www.timebomb2000.com/vb/show...er-own-bags-to-be-greener-and-not-use-plastic
I know that more and more, people are using those reusable bags--I know I do-- but even so, I still accumulate too many of those plastic grocery bags and I hate to just throw them out. I've found different ways to reuse them in the past, but since I enjoy crafting, I'm always on the look out for some way to use them in my crafting projects.
I wove a few plastic (Plarn) rugs on my Union loom once--just to see what the results would look like. I didn't want the rug to look tacky the way my grandmother's crocheted bread bag rugs looked. What she made was practical and frugal, but they still looked like bread bags. Suprisingly, my rugs turned out looking nice!
One of them I used as a door mat as a test case to see how many years it would last outdoors (in all weather) and it lasted at least 4 years (the cotton warp thread was the first to wear out). I used mainly strips cut from grey bags, with an occasional strip from a white bag thrown in, creating a random pattern in the finished rug.
I recently watched a few videos about making plarn and spinning plarn on Youtube and I might try doing that sometime too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sYI-WPuyD0&t=133s
and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms4KiFdKyj0
I also watched another video I thought was interesting---it's not so much a craft, but a possible way to recycle bags as a sheath for an ax and that made me wonder what else we could do with these bags.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms4KiFdKyj0
-- http://www.timebomb2000.com/vb/show...er-own-bags-to-be-greener-and-not-use-plastic
I know that more and more, people are using those reusable bags--I know I do-- but even so, I still accumulate too many of those plastic grocery bags and I hate to just throw them out. I've found different ways to reuse them in the past, but since I enjoy crafting, I'm always on the look out for some way to use them in my crafting projects.
I wove a few plastic (Plarn) rugs on my Union loom once--just to see what the results would look like. I didn't want the rug to look tacky the way my grandmother's crocheted bread bag rugs looked. What she made was practical and frugal, but they still looked like bread bags. Suprisingly, my rugs turned out looking nice!
One of them I used as a door mat as a test case to see how many years it would last outdoors (in all weather) and it lasted at least 4 years (the cotton warp thread was the first to wear out). I used mainly strips cut from grey bags, with an occasional strip from a white bag thrown in, creating a random pattern in the finished rug.
I recently watched a few videos about making plarn and spinning plarn on Youtube and I might try doing that sometime too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sYI-WPuyD0&t=133s
and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms4KiFdKyj0
I also watched another video I thought was interesting---it's not so much a craft, but a possible way to recycle bags as a sheath for an ax and that made me wonder what else we could do with these bags.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms4KiFdKyj0