Rug mod tutorial

Are you ready to rug mod? I've decided to go with the term "rug mod" although I do love the all the suggestions I got. Really considered going with "shagging", but I realize that would've made this an entirely different sort of blog.

You'll need a piece of carpet or a plain rug or a carpet remnant. Any size will do. And some yarn. And a big needle.

Draw your design on a piece of paper, cut it out, and lay it on the back of the carpet. Let's call that the bald side.

Trace the image.

This is the tool you are going to use. Find the biggest needle you have, and thread about a 12 inch piece of thread through it. I used embroidery floss in this picture so it would show up really well, but I find the best thread to use is heavy duty nylon thread.

Poke the needle up from the shaggy side of the carpet out the bald side on the traced line. Pull the needle up through the rug, but don't pull the tail of the blue thread all the way out. If your carpet has really thick, tough glue, you may want to wear a thimble.

Now poke the needle straight back into the exact same hole where it first poked out. See how you catch the white yarn? You're going to pull that white yarn down through the carpet.

Grab your needle and the tail of the blue thread, and pull the white yarn down through the carpet.

Then you just let go of the blue tail and the needle. See? You're left with just a little loop of white yarn on the shaggy side of the carpet. That blue thread never gets sewn into anything. It's just a tool you use to pull the white yarn through.

Keep going. Be careful when you pop the next white yarn loop through the rug that you don't pull out the first loop. The ball of yarn can just sit over there on the side as you keep working off of it.




Now you have two little white yarn loops!

Keep going around your traced design. The stitches on the back should look like this. Not too tight, not too loose.






When you have stitched all the way around, turn the carpet over and trim the loops off. The big reveal! Totally exciting! Coat the stitches on the bald side of the carpet with some glue or mod podge or caulk to hold them in place. You can buy brush-on latex rug backing from the craft store if you want. If you used a carpet remnant and you have rough edges around your rug, you can stitch on a piece of fabric like a quilt binding, or just turn the edges under and stitch or glue them in place.

Happy rug modding!