Materials:

A large ball of finger-knitting (or, this can be done in stages as you

complete littler strands of finger-knitting. This rainbow pack of yarn looks
fun!)
An old t-shirt (I used a women’s large. A Hanes t-shirt would work well.)
Scissors
28″ Hula hoop (here’s one online) You can’t make a rug much larger than
19″ on this size. I’m sure it would work on a bigger hula hoop as well.

Cut the t-shirt into 10 strips, approximately 1 1/4″ wide across the body of
the t-shirt, under the arms.
Pull the strips across the hula-hoop in a spoke pattern, going progressively
in between the spokes you’ve already added.

After adding the 10 strips stretched across the hula-hoop into 20 spokes,
you’re ready to start.
You need to create an odd number of spokes to make the weaving pattern
(over/under) work. Do this by pushing two of the spokes together. Even
out the spacing on rest of the spokes across the hula hoop.

Tie one end of the finger knitting to one of the spokes. I started with the
one that is doubled up, so I wouldn’t forget.
Right now treat each loop as one spoke. Start weaving by going over a
spoke and under a spoke, around and around the circle.

If you have an extra large ball of finger-knitting, you’ll have to squeeze the
ball in between the spokes and re-space them afterwards. Every time you
get back to the double spoke, check to make sure you haven’t missed any,
you should be doing the opposite (over or under) of what you did on the
last round.
You want to pull the finger-knitting so that its snug, but don’t pull it tight or it
will make the rug gap and pucker.

Repeat this pattern around and around until the rug gets to be about 7 – 9
inches across.
Now, you will start to weave such that each of the current spokes will be
divided into two spokes. For the spoke that was double, pull it apart such
that you treat one as having individual spokes like the rest of the warp
spokes. For the other spoke, have the two parts of the loop remain together
so that you maintain an odd number of spokes. I tied a piece of string
around the one I wanted to keep together, so I would remember each time I
came around the circle again.
You can see in the photo below that I am going over and under each
individual spoke. The ball is still big, but not for long! The smaller the ball
got, the easier it was to work with.

The kids found it easiest to do the weaving with the hula hoop on a
table. They enjoyed the weaving, but for only about 15 minutes at a time.
They quickly got a hang of pulling the ball over and under the warp spokes
and noticed quickly if something got off.

We found it easiest to do a bunch of weaving (over/under) in a row, as

below, and then to pull the finger-knitting taut (not too tight!), such that it fits
snugly against the circle.
I think the ball of finger-knitting was made for this hula-hoop, because it fit
just perfectly. We wove until the ball was gone! Generally, you want to stop
about 4 inches before the edge of the hula hoop.

Now comes the fun part. Cut and tie each spoke individually.
You want the ties to be fairly tight because if the rug starts to loosen, it will
start to curl into a bowl.

Continue to cut and tie each spoke as you go around.

When you get to the double spoke, cut it, and then . . .

. . .take one of the pieces of the double spoke and re-weave it over and
under some of the finger knitting strands next to it, and then tie.
Voila! Finis. It’s slightly counter-intuitive, but if the rug is curling. Push the
weft (finger-knitting) in towards the center of the rug and re-tighten the ties.
This way the circumference of the circle is smaller and the strips of finger
knitting won’t be pulling as much. You can leave the rug with the ties loose
as below. I think this makes a striking center piece.
Or, to hide the ties, as in the first photo in this post, I chose the “right” side
of the rug, by choosing the side I thought looked the nicest. I flipped the
rug to the “wrong” side, and wove each piece of the tie into the back of the
rug.
The back of the finger knitting hula hoop rug looks like this with the ties
woven in:

The front of the rug looked like this:

I decided I like the finger knitting hula hoop rug most on our wall.