Coming together

I am a bit amazed at how the bench and the table fit so well up against each other.

I've been brainstorming a list of runner possibilities. I have studied making homemade rugs for quite a few years, so I have plenty of ideas.  Here are some of them:

Use the jute from my crocheted bedroom rug to make a rug that goes over the carpet remnants. I've already unraveled it. To make it cover the area that I want probably requires knitting or weaving; crochet uses much more fiber to cover a given area. Then I would dye it to the color I want.

Overdye the carpet remnants.  Did you know that dyeing your old wall-to-wall carpet was possible? The internet says that it only works for nylon or wool, though. The way to tell if it's nylon is to take a little bit of the fiber off, and burn it (under controlled conditions, of course).  Supposedly burning nylon should melt and form a small, clear bead on the burnt end. The other way is to immerse it in a little chlorine bleach overnight; if it is nylon, the bleach will eat it away entirely within 12 hours. So the internet says. Wool will smell like burning hair when it is burnt.

When I tried the burn test, however, it didn't look like nylon to me--I think it is probably acrylic--and in any case, it is dirty and probably wouldn't take dye very well.

Make a braided rug, probably from wool yarns. This would be somewhat time-consuming, and definitely expensive. The advantage of using yarns over fabrics is that you don't need to fold the raw edges in, so it goes much faster.

Weave a rug.  That requires finishing my current weaving project, which is currently stalled at 25% complete.

Flip the carpet remnants over and paint the backing, which is woven plastic. I'm not sure how well the paint will adhere, though, and I would consider this a temporary solution at best. The painted texture is not going to sit well with some family members.

Find a used runner and overdye it.

Use my drawer full of shrunken wool clothing, which could be cut up and applied to a backing and dyed. I did a bit of searching for local sources of industrial felt, and haven't really found any.

Buy enough yarn to get started, and knit a rug in a loop stitch.

Buy a length of canvas, and make a floorcloth.