Maggie's Mat

This is our beautiful dog, Maggie. We've only had her since October last year but she's already part of the family and so is becoming another unwilling victim of my crafts...



Despite being a lovely looking girl, Maggie has a beard that most grown human men would envy. The only problem that this causes, (apart from her occasionally being referred to as 'Beardface' or 'The Beard'), is that she creates a small lake on the kitchen floor when she drinks out of her water bowl.

I trawled the local pet shop and the internet in search of an absorbent but non-slip mat for her bowls to try to lessen the number of  cases of damp-sock occurring, but none were to my taste: either garish colours or silly slogans and none that could claim to be both absorbent and non-slip.

Cue light-bulb moment! Why didn't I think of making my own before?!

Due the its size and the monotony of the pattern, it took me a few hours to make but it was so easy I feel silly for even considering paying for one; I raided my stash so the yarn cost nothing.

To make it non-slip, I intend to buy some of that non-slip mat that you can get from pound-shops, (usually used for car dashboards to stop trinkets from rolling about when you're driving), cut it to a little smaller than the mat itself and sew it on the the underside. I also might crochet a little paw print and applique it on.

The mat I made measures 18" x 12". I used 2 strands of yarn, one black and one off-white. I have no idea of the yarn weight or what they are made of as they came from my stash, but I used a 5mm hook and it took 70 stitches across to reach the 18" length and 30 rows of UK half treble crochet, (US Hdc) to reach 12" wide.

The pattern is easily adapted to any size of mat required. See below:

I really like the random effect of two strands together.

Dog Bowl Mat
Foundation Row: Ch as many as you need to reach your desired length, then ch 2 more.
R1: Htr in 3rd ch from hook then in every st to end. Ch2 then turn.R2: Htr in every st to end, ch2 then turn.
Rpt R2 as many times as you need to reach your desired width.
And that's it! So simple, I don't know why I hadn't though of it before...

Finished :)

The perfect size for Maggie's two bowls.

Maggie approves... well, she's apathetic.

**This pattern is for personal use only and may not be sold, reprinted or copied in anyway without my permission. If you would like to sell something that you have made using my pattern, I ask that you give credit to me as the pattern designer and that you include a link back to the free pattern so that others may have the opportunity to make the item themselves.**