Ready for some more DIY dog tug toy fun? Let’s get loopy! For those of you who love our square knot fleece dog tug toy (thanks for all the great feedback), you’ll be happy to hear that we have tons of other dog tug toy DIYs to share with you. Oli prefers a nice loop to get his mouth through, so here is a simple variation for turning a basic square knot tug toy into a tug toy with a loop and tail for dual play. See the post below for step-by-step photos and instructions for how to weave a square knot fleece DIY loop dog tug toy for fun interactive play.
When I first started making tugs, we needed to make a new tug toy every month or two, thanks to the destructive dog teamwork of “Sharky McFang” and “Oli the Ripper”. Years later, Humphrey is no longer a destructive puppy and Oli is a senior dog, and these types of fleece tug toys last for ages at our place. As a bonus, they machine wash for easy toy cleaning, too. Over time, we’ve created all sorts of different dog tug toy DIYs for the boys and their furfriends. Many of these are shared on the blog to show readers different tug toy patterns and designs. Simple straight woven tugs and easy variations, like this DIY loop dog tug toy, are still favourites.
How to Weave DIY Loop and Tail Dog Tug Toy
Weaving Method
If this is your first DIY dog tug toy attempt, you might find it helpful to make a basic straight toy or two (square or spiral) first before you start joining and pairing ends for loops. But this DIY loop tug toy is one of the easier variations for making shapes. The pictured toy uses a simple square knot weaving pattern with a simple repeating pattern for easy weaving. The DIY loop dog tug toy instructions below can also be adapted for other weaving patterns. Check out our simple spiral DIY dog tug toys for an easy alternative weaving pattern.
Preparing the Materials
To make a similar DIY loop dog tug toy, you will need:
- Polar fleece (or alternate fabric)
- Scissors
To weave a DIY loop dog tug toy with tail, as shown, clean fabric is cut into 4 long narrow strips. You can scale the toy to suit your dog and your materials by altering the width and/or length of the fleece strips. I’ve made many different shapes and sizes over the years. Fortunately, when making a tug with fleece there is also no need to be too fussy about straight lines when cutting. Yay! Weaving long strips can feel a little confusing at first. You may find it helpful to work with four different colours until you get the hang of things. As a bonus, using different colours of fleece also makes for a pretty multi-coloured tug toy.
On the subject of colours, when this project was first shared, the example tug wasn’t multicoloured. To help our readers better see the tug toy making process, I made more tugs and the photos in this post have been updated from the original grey loop toy. The new images show the loop toy made with different fleece in four colours for added clarity in our how-to images. This is handy for showing the alignment of the colours on the sides as you join the loop and weave into the tug handle. Hope the changes help!
Weaving the DIY Loop Dog Tug Toy
Starting the weave:
- Align your strips into a single long bundle.
- Knot your bundle at the point where you plan to eventually close the circle, leaving enough length on the other side to make your tug handle later. Keep this knot loose – it is temporary just to secure the strands while you get started on your weaving.
Where to start depends on how big a loop vs. tail you’d like to make. There’s no real right or wrong way to do it, just personal preferences. A starting point approximately 1/4 from the end was used in the tug shown. This means that roughly 50% of the material in the finished tug is loop and 50% (2×25%) is loop joint, tail, and end knot. The loop portion of the tug was woven from the temporary knot until the loose strips of my working end were a similar length to the loose strips at the starting knot.
Weaving the body of the loop:
Keeping the working end of the tug stable and secure is key to getting a uniform pattern. See the tips and tricks below for extra help, if needed. You can secure the starting end to something, if you wish, but I prefer to be seated with it nipped between my knees. This allows me to freely flip the strands to the front, back over a shoulder, and from side to side as I weave.
- Starting on the working (long) side of your temporary knot, position the strips into a cross (+).
- Weave the fleece strips together using a simple square knot technique. See our square knot tug toy for instructions, a weaving pattern diagram, and step-by-step images for weaving.
- Once you have woven a long enough section of tug that you would like to join the ends to make your loop (see my comments on starting point above), untie your temporary knot.
- Pull the ends of your tug together to form a loop. Try to align like colours.
- Tie your side colours to close out the appearance of a ring when joining the loop. This looks neat and tidy, but also secures the loop to make it easier for you to pair strands and start to weave the handle (further instructions below). In the toy shown, the side colours when I pulled the loop closed were black (shown tied in the image below) and blue (tied on the opposite side). The red and green strips were not tied together at this stage.
Weaving the tail / handle:
Now that the loop is closed, you’re ready to weave the tail. It is created by continuing the square weave, but there are now eight strands of fleece (four from each end). We’re going to pair those up and weave them in matched colour sets to create the tail and final end knot. A little prep work is required to get things into position before you continue weaving.
- Pair your fleece strips so that the eight ends become four pairs. Match colours, if applicable.
- Position the strips back into a starting cross (+) for your square weave. Try to ensure that the colours (if applicable) line up with the closure point of your loop.
- Resume weaving until you are approaching the end of your strands of fleece. Not too close though! Leave enough room to tie off the end to finish the toy.
- Loop and knot securely, leaving a tassel at the end, and trim if/as needed.
Additional Information and Tug Toy Tips
Pattern Consistency
As noted in the above and our detailed instructions for weaving a square knot tug toy, if you rotate the working ends, mix up strand position, or accidentally miss a loop or two along the way, it will show in the shape and/or colour pattern. Not to worry, though. Your dog isn’t judging on looks. Just fun! We have a post in our FAQs on troubleshooting pattern problems if you need help.
End Knots
Don’t leave yourself short on the tie-off. You’ll need more fabric than you might think. If you’ve gone too far, you can unpick to get more free fleece, or switch to an alternative end knot.
Additional Toy Making Help and Information
Helpful information is also available in our tug toy FAQs, tips, and troubleshooting mini-series:
Safety first, furfriends! Remember, no matter what a toy is made of or how it’s made, toys are meant for supervised interactive play. Know your dog before giving him or her any new toy. Some dogs try to eat toys or parts (whether bought or handmade) and that’s doggone dangerous. Toys are for playing, and playtime is always safer (and more fun!) with you involved. You can read more in our dog toy safety post, including tips and helpful links for safer playtime. Have fun and play safe!
