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Category: Plastic Bag Crafts

Recycled Plastic Fat Bottom Bag

Cindy20 Comments


I present my plarn fat bottom bag that I crocheted using recycled plastic newspaper bags. You may remember me saying that it is difficult for me to obtain pretty colors in plastic bags for my crafting. Well thanks to a suggestion from a blogger friend, I asked my local library to save their newspaper bags for me. They have been giving me one pink and one orange plastic bag daily from their newspapers. Anyway I saved up the plastic bags and crocheted my first fat bottom bag.

You may notice that the pink shade on the last few rounds of the bag and handles are darker. That was because the newspaper company changed the color of bags they were using. At first I was upset that I couldn’t finish my recycled bag using all the same color of pink but then once I was forced to use the darker bags, it turned out to be a nice contrast for the finished project.

As I mentioned this is my first fat bottom crocheted bag. The original pattern in written only in Portuguese. But there is an English chart and a wonderful tutorial including the lining over at Bend Beanies Blog which is a life saver. She has great pictures and helpful tips to help translate this awesome free pattern.

Below you will find some pictures I took as I worked the pattern.

Earthtone Crocheted Kitchen Sets

Cindy4 Comments

I finished up this crocheted earthtone kitchen set for my Mom’s birthday. It includes a round ripple dishcloth that I made using Julee’s RR dishcloth pattern. I changed it up a bit and made the center flat.

Below is my open mesh magic dishcloth along with a scrubbie dot I crocheted using recycled plastic bags.

Click on photos to supersize them

Next is a hostess gift I put together for a friend. It includes another RR dishcloth and a plarn scrubbie dot. The little flowered tag is cut from a recycled greeting card. I thought it matched the gift and look perfect for a Spring gift so I used it as my gift tag.

Anyway just wanted to check in with everyone and show some of my recent crocheting. I’ve am busy finishing up a fat bottom bag I am crocheting from pink plastic newspaper bags and just started a special order purse being crocheted from vcr tape for a repeat customer of mine. I will be back soon to share all those recycled craft projects with you as soon as I get them done.
Happy crafting everyone!

Plastic Trash Rug

Cindy30 Comments

This crocheted rug has been a work in progress for quite some time. I’m happy to say its done — Yea! It is completely crocheted from plastic trash. I used recycled bags from bread, hotdog buns, bagels, toilet paper, frozen foods, hashbrowns, paper towel packaging, hamburger buns, taco shells, hoagie buns, and other pieces of plastic from numerous products having plastic packaging. This plastic is the heavier gauge stuff and it’s much harder to crochet and does make your hands and joints sore.

Because this plastic was much heavier than the normal thin plastic grocery bags, I cut the strips only about 1/2 inch wide. I cut the plastic into strips using my standard plarn making method to assemble the plastic strips.

I crocheted it all using single crochet stitches as this is a bit easier on the hands. A word of advice though, take lots of breaks from this project as it will help your hands and joints from getting too sore. Also if your rug doesn’t want to lay down flat, apply some gentle heat from a blow dryer, and flatten out your rug as you warm up the plastic. This really helped as my rug wanted to curl up a bit but with the heat from the dry blower, I was able to get my rug to lay down fairly flat.

Below you will find the general directions for crocheting this recycled plastic rug. Please be aware that this pattern is just a loose guideline for making your own unique rug using recycled plastic. You may need to add a few more stitches here and there so your ends lay down flat. I re-worked several rounds at times as the rug just didn’t want to lay down very flat. But remember the dry blower tip and try this out if needed. With that being said, enjoy the project and happy crocheting!

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Recycled Plastic Oval Rug Pattern

Materials needed:

Plastic bread bags and any other plastic packaging that you can cut into loops 1/2 inch wide
to create plastic bag yarn or plarn.

Hook:
N (9 mm) USA size crochet hook

Description:
Recycled plastic oval rug measures 16 inches wide and 30 inches long

Directions:
Ch 36 (approx. 14 inches)

Green Easter Basket

Cindy11 Comments

My Easter basket project this year uses the bottom of a laundry soap bottle and plastic bags. I cut the bottom off a plastic soap bottle and used it as a base for my Easter basket. I then crocheted around the base and up with recycled plastic bags or plarn.

The pink bunny was crocheted using AmiAmour’s free crochet pattern found here. This is my first official ami animal and while I’m not going into the ami making business, I was pleased with the outcome of my Easter bunny.

Oh and I used cut up plarn for the grass in my Easter basket. That way it can be recycled after the holidays into another project. Happy Easter!

Free Pattern for Recycled Plastic Easter Basket

Materials needed:
Plastic bags cut into 3/4″ strips of white bags (3-4 bags)
And approx. 4-5 bags of green and yellow plastic bags
1) Plastic handle from a soap box or other plastic strap
1) Plastic laundry soap base cut from bottle
Metal punch and hammer for making holes in plastic base

Hooks: H (5 mm) US sized metal hook
and J ( 6 mm) US size crochet hook
Small Steel crochet hook for first round on base

Description: Recycled Plastic Easter Basket
Basket measures 7″ wide and 4-1/4″ tall with 20″ handle strap
at base 6″ wide and 3″ across.

Directions:
Using the base cut from a laundry soap bottle (mine was 6″ long and 3″ wide), punch holes around the base as shown in the photo. I used a metal punch and a hammer to put my holes in the plastic base.