So what is plarn, you ask?  It’s yarn made out of plastic.  Plastic bags, to be exact.  The kind you get at the grocery store,  Walmart, etc.

I made this rug today because I was annoyed that I’d YET AGAIN forgotten to take my bags to Walmart, to place them in the recycling bin out front.  I figured this out this morning when I came back from, you guessed it, Walmart.

I have bags of bags.  Several of them, crammed to nearly bursting.  I’d been stowing them in the back of my car because my husband (who is a great guy, about most stuff anyway) handles these bags one of two ways–he throws them away (what about the planet, I demand when I catch him), or he’ll take them to the local recycling center and try to slip them into the plastics recycling dumpster that has a sign clearly stating “NO PLASTIC BAGS”.  He swears that he’s never seen the sign and after all, aren’t they plastic?

As I was glaring at my pile of bag-of-bags, I remembered reading about plarn on Pinterest.  I’d actually tried working with it a couple of years ago, with mixed results.  I booted up my laptop and Googled “plarn crochet projects”, then looked in Google Images at what others have done with it.  Round rugs, rectangle rugs, coasters, even sleeping mats for the homeless.  The blog I read about that one said that it took 300-400 bags for one of those.  Wow.  I decided to start with a more manageable project.

I hauled my bags into the house and created Bag Mountain.   Pulling a few bags out of the pile, I grabbed my scissors and cut the bags into strips (there are plenty of places online to see how this is done, and also show how to connect the strips).

I decided on a crochet stitch that I was familiar with and I thought would give it a nice look and feel, the moss stitch (also known as the linen stitch).   I decided on my colors based on the colors of bags on hand:  most of them were Walmart white, with blue (from Food Lion grocery store) the next most common color.

Using my largest (N) crochet hook, I connected a few blue loops of plastic bag to create some yarn and crocheted a row of chains to a length I thought would be good for the width of a small throw rug (I just measured it and it’s 25 inches across).  NOTE:  I didn’t make a lot of the yarn ahead of my crocheting, because I wanted to be able to change colors when I needed to.

After the first row of blue, I switched to white bags and began the moss stitch, which is incredibly simple:  just a repeating pattern of single crochet–chain–single crochet–chain.  There are some great videos on YouTube on how to do this stitch.

I decided to do a few rows of the white:

In the photo above, the white and blue rectangles to the lower left are the folded pieces of plastic bag I was pulling apart into a loop and adding to my work.  On the lower right is a dryer sheet that I used to wipe my hands on from time to time, because static electricity was making it a little tricky to work with the bags (it helped a lot).

After 5 rows of white, I switched and did a single row of blue, then resumed with the white:

I ended up with five white sections.  When I finished the last blue row, I wove the ends into the rug and crocheted a blue border on either side.  Below is the finished result.  It’s thick and flexible, and seems to be pretty sturdy considering what it’s made of.

I used around 130 bags (a drop in the bucket when I see all the bags I have left).  I’ve read that these rugs can slip on slippery surfaces, so using no-slip rug pad is probably a good idea.

I’m not sure where I’ll use it.  The bathroom?  Back door mat?  I want to give it some normal use, to see if it holds up, before attempting another plarn project.

As far as a craft project goes, it’s fairly easy, and incredibly satisfying to know that these plastic bags, at least, were saved from the landfill.