How to Make a Plastic Bag Blanket

Hello! today I will be teaching you how to make a blanket entirely from plastic bags! follow these steps and you will be done in no time!

Step 1: Materials

Materials needed:

Plastic bags (approximately 500 plastic bags)

Scissors

Crochet needle (12mm)

Step 2: Flatten Each Bag

Firstly, you need to flatten each bag by pulling from each corner. Place four to five bags on top of each other at a time. Place them horizontally with the handles on one side and the bottom seam on the opposite side.

Step 3: Fold Each Bag

Secondly, you must fold each group of bags into one long strip. To do this, you need to fold the bag over 3 fold from the top and bottom until it becomes one long strip.

Step 4: Cut Edges Off

After the group of bags are folded and laying horizontally, cut the two ends off to eliminate the bottom seam and the handles.

Step 5: Cut Loops

Now that you have a folded strip, cut the strip into seven, two inch strips and unwrap them to separate them into individual loops. If you did this correctly, you should end up with 7 plastic loops for each bag so about 28 to 35 strips per group.

Step 6: Connect Plastic Loops by Knot

Now that you have these individual plastic loops, connect them by using a simple chain knot to link them together. Continue this process until you have enough loops attached to roll up into a ball....similar to a ball of yarn.

Step 7: Roll Line Into Crochet Ball!

Once you have completed connecting as many loops as possible, you will have a mountain of connected plastic loops in a huge pile. To avoid tangling, wrap the attached loops into a big ball, similar to a ball of yarn. You could make these balls as small or as big as you like. The bigger the ball, the less you have to introduce a new loop to the crocheted blanket. Merging a new ball of yarn could get a little tricky, as I've experienced.

Step 8: Begin Crocheting!

Now that you have your ball of plastic yarn, you can begin crocheting. The process is exactly like you are crocheting a blanket. You will begin by making a chain stitch. I did not count the number of chains. Instead, I lay the chain on my lap and decided how wide I wanted to make the plastic bag blanket. Once the chain was complete and I was happy with the width, I turned over the chain and began crocheting. I used a one and a half chain stitch throughout the entire blanket. I determined the length the same way. I kept placing the work in progress on my lap and decided how long I wanted to make the blanket. I continued crocheting until I was happy with the length. I hope these steps provide an adequate explanation and how to guide on how I approached this project from start to finish. Good Luck!

Step 9: Be Patient!

Finishing a full blanket can take quite some time! It took me close to 9 hours to finish this one. So sit tight get comfy and start crocheting bags!!!!

Step 10: Optional Step: Fringes

To make the blanket a little more decorative, I added fringes to each end. I had extra strips left over so instead of throwing them out (recycle them). I decided to you them to make fringes. I took each strip and folded it over. I then wrapped the folded strip over the crochet needle and slipped it into each individual opening on each end of the blanket. Once inserted, you will have a loop on the top and a double strand below. Flip the strand over and insert it through the loop and pull. This creates a fringe. Continue until each opening on the top and bottom of the blanket has a fringe. Since the length of the fringes were too long I cut the length of fringes equally on both sides.

Step 11: Optional Step. Holding Strings

To make it easier to carry the blanket, I decided to crochet two single stitch cords on each end of the blanket. I made the cords long enough to be able to make a bow. Double knotting would be too difficult to undo. It works by rolling the blanket and tying both strings together. This creates a handle to carry the blanket with ease.