Knitting Instructions for a Seamless Tote Bag Made from Plarn
I promised you knitting instructions for bags made from plastic yarn, and this week I've got a great one to start with. Depending on the length of the handles, you can use this as a purse or a tote bag. After all, you'll need something to replace the plastic bags you've stopped using to carry things!
A Better Kind of Plastic Bag
Have you been having fun learning to make plastic yarn? If you've determined which method works best for you and are ready to move onto knitting this fancy plastic yarn, I've got an easy seamless tote bag pattern to try your hand at. Although you may want to knit this with any plarn you have, it will look much prettier if you stick with one or two colors.
This pattern uses size 10 1/2 (US) straight needles and a 24" 10 1/2 round needle. The "Sl" abbreviation means slip one stitch, knit one stitch, pass the slipped stitch over the knit one.
Bag Base:
Cast on 8 stitches.
Row 1: Sl 1, K6, P1
Row 2: Sl 1, K1, Inc. 1, K to last stitch, P1
Repeat Row 2 until you have 20 stitches.
Next Row: Sl 1, K to last stitch, P1.
Continue until piece is 10" from start.
Decrease row: Sl 1, K to last 3 stitches, SKP, P.
Repeat decrease row until 8 stitches remain.
Bind off loosely.
Bag Body:
Pick up and K 88 sts. around edge of base.
Increase 10 sts. evenly in each of the next 2 rows.
108 stitches.
Bind off 10, K8, bind off 17, K8, bind off remaining stitches.
Handles:
Use two separate balls of plarn and knit both handles at the same time.
Knit is stockinette stitch (K row, P row) starting with Purl on wrong side.
Continue until handles are desired length.
Attach handle to body of tote bag. You can sew them with fishing line or use a crochet hook and weave the plarn to attach it to the body of the tote bag. You could also use a thick plastic needle and use the plarn to sew the handle to the bag.
There -- what do you think? You could get the hang of this knitting with plastic, couldn't you? Soon you'll find yourself running out of plastic bags, so enlist friends and neighbors to give you theirs. Remember -- the goal should be to rid the entire Earth of plastic bags, so running out is a good thing.
Pass on these knitting instructions too, and watch knitting with plastic gain momentum.
