This past Tuesday, I came across Kim Werker’s “Craft for the Animals!” post which include (among other things) a link to a free, downloadable pattern for a pet mat she has designed.
Inspired by her blog post and curious to see how my balls of yarn scarps would look in an actual project, I set to work making a pet mat using the pattern provided.
With a 10 mm hook in hand, I paired one of my scrap yarn balls

with a strand of Red Heart Super Saver navy.
The combination of a very dark yarn with one that is constantly changing color did not make for the easiest yarn to work with, so when I wrote my blog, late Tuesday night, I had only gotten this far with the project:

While the result was quite striking, had I used lighter, solid colors to learn the pattern, it would have been appreciably easier.
However, once I was ten rounds in there was no looking back, so this morning, after I had had a cup of coffee, I sat down with the pet mat-to-be and a generous supply of stitch markers and set to work.
While several of the design elements of the original were lost in my rendition of this pattern, it still resulted in a useable pet mat:

When Monday comes, I will contact the animal rescues in the area where I live to find one that can make use of pet mat donations, and once I find a rescue or shelter that can take the pet mats, I will tackle this project once again.
Hi WOW this looks great! I have a suggestion for you of shelters to donate crochet blankets too. Go to http://www.h4ha.org and you can look up any shelter near you that accepts them. It’s called Hugs For Homeless Animals, or The Snuggles Project. I’ve been giving them blankets too.
Have a great day!
Nancy
Nanacy, thank for pointing me to that website. It should make for less time finding a place for the blankets and more time making them.
I found a shelter in my area that will take donations, now I’m looking forward to finishing my move, so I can start hooking them up!