play yard play mat NEED HELP!

[MamaWolfe]

I've been working on my play yard for more than a year now, I'm really hoping to get it done this year! I decided to do different kinds of crafts so it would have different textures, looks, etc, and one of the things I did was rug hooking. It isn't the kind where you have individual yarns pieces that you knot, but the kind where you have one continuous piece and it just loops up at each square. Unfortunately, after many hours of doing this, I realized that if you pull a loop, it unravels the whole thing! I can't imagine scrapping the idea after this much time into it AND the fact that it looks amazing. Is there anything I can do to the backside to keep the yarn in place? My mom suggested using some rubber stuff that is for the back of hooked rugs, but I don't want to use chemicals, sort of defeats the purpose of doing all this wool stuff, ya know? I was thinking maybe some kind of natural glue? Any suggestions???

Thanks!

[DeerMother]

Could you sew a felted wool thrift store blanket to the bottom?

[Rhiannon Feimorgan]

Hmmmmm.....I've never done this sort of thing. My first thought would be a flour & water paste. This is what I use to starch crochet snowflakes. It would make it very stiff though and wouldn't hold up to getting wet. You could look around your craft store for a natural or at least non toxic glue. I'm wondering if rubber cement is made with real rubber?

[zech13_9_goforgold]

Elmers makes a fabric craft glue that I really like because it is thick and can also be used on paper (won't wrinkle it). I don't know how "natural" it is, but it's non-toxic.

What a tough thing. I'm so sorry.