Rag Baskets - A Tutorial

Maybe I am getting a bit ahead of myself with this idea but I couldn't help seeing how nest-like the Little Bowls were. And of course nests are made to hold eggs!

 

 These could well be given away in a few weeks. I had better make some notes about how I made these; what choices I made about the process and most importantly if there is anything I would do differently if I make more in the future.

 Making Crochet Rag Baskets

Preparing the Yarn

I chose some old shirts for these. The fabric had been fairly fine when new and had been made softer (and finer) by lots of washing and wearing. This would make it easy to handle during the crochet stage. Old bed linen might also work well. No old, used stuff to hand? Then of course new fabric is fine and you are less restricted about colour/pattern choice. I found I needed three shirt backs per basket and this gave me a variety of colours.

1. Lay the fabric out and mark into into strips about 4cm wide along the bias of the fabric.
   (When you look closely at the fabric you will see the threads at right angles to each other. 'On the bias' means that the marked lines will run diagonally across the threads.)
2. When you have marked them all out, cut them all so you have a bundle of strips.
   (Using a rotary cutter and cutting mat, should you have them, would make this part far less tedious and you might find you can layer up the fabric and cut a few layers at once. )
3. Near the ends of each strip cut a small slit. I found it easiest to fold the end over by a couple of cm and snip the fold with scissors to make a slit about 1 cm long, 1.5 cm from the end. It doesn't need to be exact just so long as there are small slits near the end.
4. Join the strips. Lay 2 of them along in front of you, end to end. Take the head of the first strip through the slit in the tail of the second strip and pass it over and through the slit in its own tail.
   Then holding the free ends, pull the two strips firmly apart until the join makes a smooth 'knot'. This is easy to work crochet over. Any little points sticking out from the worked crochet can be trimmed a little or tucked into the spaces with  a knitting needle.
5. Carry on making further joins with the rest of the strips, winding into a ball as you go. It is very easy to add further strips as you crochet so you don't need to be too bothered about running out before your basket is big enough. I used one strip each of my three fabrics in turn but of course the strips were varied in length so I was fairly sure of getting a random effect in the final work. 

Linking the strips

The join pulled tight

Things I found out about making the yarn

• I used the bias cut because there is a slight stretch in bias cut strips which makes for easier crochet. Had I decided to go with the grain of the fabric I could have gone for a 'snip and tear' technique which would have been faster even than the rotary wheel but it would have been harder to crochet and more inclined to fray and shed thread.
• In each of my trios of shirt backs, there was one that was a bit thicker or stiffer than the others and it would have been a good idea to make those strips a little narrower so that the crochet tension was more even.  
• This Knitting Daily  TV Video clip was the best info I found on the 'net for recyling fabric to make yarn.

Making the basket

(Please note that the crochet terms I use here are the English terms. dc = double crochet.This is the same as the US Single crochet )

Hook: 5.5mm

Tension: 1 dc st = 1 cm.

Basket measures 8cm high and 12 cm in diameter.

To begin, make a chain of 5 st and slip stitch to form a ring. 

Round 1: 8 dc into the ring. Mark the end of this round with a coloured thread.

From here, work in a spiral.
I worked the dc in all subsequent rounds only into the back strand of each dc in the round below.

Working in a spiral

Working into the back strand of each stitch

Round 2: 2 dc in each of the  8 dc in Round 1

Round 3: 2 dc in each of the 16 dc in Round 2

Round 4: *2  dc in first dc of Round 3, 1 dc in next dc*. Repeat from * to* to the end of the round.

This forms the base of the basket. Keep spiralling up to make the side.

Round 5:  1 dc in each dc of previous round.

Repeat Round 5 until the side is as high as you would like. I used about 7 further rounds.

At the end of the last round slip stitch into each of the next 2 stitches to gradually blend the final round into the one before.

Bind off. 

Use a large eyed needle to thread the end of the yarn back through the last row and trim it off.

Now decide which side you prefer for the outside. 

The leftover scraps from the sleeves can be used to make linings or decorations to finish the baskets.