Here in Hawaii, flip flops, or slippers as we call them, are the shoes of choice year round. Currently, I have three pairs to wear outside, and one pair for indoors.

Most Hawaiian residents remove their shoes before entering a home, a custom we follow in ours. But I don’t always want to go around barefoot inside and will wear either socks in cool weather or my indoor slippers when it’s warm.

Flip Flop Soles Made from Yoga Mats?

On a recent shopping trip with my daughter, I found a pair of slippers that had soles made out of yoga mats! When I tried them on in the store, they were so comfortable that I immediately purchased them.

But when I got them home and started walking in them, I realized that the thin straps and hard thongs that separate the toes made my feet hurt. The one time I went grocery shopping in them, I was limping by the time I got home.

Seems the makers of these slippers spent so much time on the soles they forgot about ensuring the comfort of the straps. But precisely  because the soles were so comfortable, I didn’t want to give them up. How to make them comfortable? Crochet on the straps and thongs to provide a cushion for my sensitive feet.

Creating a Comfortable Crochet Cushion for my flip flops

I had already crocheted a pair of slippers to wear at a friend’s wedding, so I knew it was something I could do. When I crocheted these slippers, I was in a hurry and decided to let the yarn do the work for me. My daughter said they looked like fuzzy caterpillars!

For my yoga mat slippers, I went for “understated” and chose some camouflage-colored, worsted-weight acrylic yarn I had in my stash and an H/5.00 mm crochet hook. Then it was a simple matter of single crocheting around the first strap, wrapping a layer of yarn around the thong, and single crocheting down the length of the other strap.

However, when I reached the thong, the yarn ball was too fat to slide under the straps which I needed to do in order to wrap the thong in yarn. To solve this problem, I –

• Unwrapped a long length of yarn from the main ball, making sure I had enough yarn to finish the second strap, and wound it into a small ball.
• Then I removed my hook from the loop, taking care not to pull it out or stretch it, and wrapped the yarn around the thong, starting at the bottom near the sole and working up to the top.
• After I finished wrapping the thong, I reinserted my hook in the loop and continued single crocheting the other strap.

It took me all of 30 minutes to crochet on both slippers.

If you’ve never crocheted on flip flops, this video will show you just how easy it is.

Crocheted Flip Flops in a Multitude of Colors and Textures

My goal is to purchase some more inexpensive slippers and decorate them in different colors and yarn textures, perhaps even adding flowers and other embellishments.

That’s one of the many advantages of living in a warm weather climate where the dress code is almost always casual; you don’t have to spend a lot of money on shoes!