Let me preface this by saying I am not an expert at crochet. The rug itself could be crocheted, knit or even braided. Mainly I was excited by learning how to turn discarded Tee shirts into "yarn" that can used to make something attractive and useful.
It all starts with a tee shirt-
actually 20 of them. That is how many it took me to make a rug about 3 feet across. But I wanted a substantial rug with some heft to it, so I used double strands. So, potentially the rug could have been made with only 10 shirts.
The first step is to cut the shirt from arm hole to arm hole.
The lower portion of the shirt is what we are going to use. The top portion of the shirt with the sleeves can be discarded, unless you can come up with another use for it (if you do- let me know. I hate to just throw things away!).
Also cut off the hem band on the bottom of the shirt and discard.
Next, fold the material in half with the sides of the shirt together, leaving the raw open edges on the top and bottom.
Turn the fabric so the fold is at the top and start cutting strips from bottom, stopping an inch from the top. The width of the strips is up to your discretion. The wider the strip, or the heavier the fabric (not all tee shirts use the same weight jersey) the thicker your yarn will be, but the less yarn you will end up with.
Now unfold the fabric and it should look like this...
Sorry this is out of focus, but you get the idea.
Now we are going to cut the strips apart, one thickness at a time, because we will be doing different things with each layer.
The top layer we will cut the strips straight across.
The bottom layer the strip will be cut on a diagonal to create one continuous strip.
Sorry, I think that is my stomach protruding into the picture!!
Once you cut the last strip, you are left with a pile that looks a little like intestines.
Now the strip needs to be stretched to lengthen it and make it curl into the useable yarn.
Now use the yarn any way you want, like a rug perhaps?
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