Working with Scraps

ladyjewell wrote

on Nov 12, 2009 12:24 PM

If you do a lot of different projects with yarn, like I do, you have a bag or box or drawer or two (or five) full of yarn that you bought more (or less) than you needed for a project but don’t have enough of for a new project and are too frugal to through away.

OK, you can do any number of ‘green’ things with them, like using them to add color to gifts, but if you are a rabid (or poor--wait, that isn’t PC. I meant, fiscally challenged--like me) crocheter, you hate to give up those yards of yarn. So don’t.

HOW IT WORKS:

1. Figure out how many yards you will need for the new project. Write it out, so you remember how you got to that number later (=D) and tuck it into the bag/box you plan to keep your project in.

2. Grab up every bit of scrap yarn of a yard or more in length in every color, weight, content, etc. in the house and organize it into bags/boxes/whatever by color family (or hue, or tone). I broke mine out almost6 like doing laundry---pastels, brights, and darks.

TIP: Pastels were anything that you’d put in a baby blanket (yes, I’ve done my fair share, which is why I, a pastel-hating person, have enough to knit a new baby blanket or sweater out of the scraps); brights were the neon-ish colors, including most of a roll of glow-in-the-dark white and a skein each of neon pink, yellow, and green that I inherited); and darks were any of the jewel-toned or darker colors, ranging from emerald to forest, ruby to burgundy/brick, magenta, charcoal, cobalt to indigo, and charcoal to black.

3. Take one group and break your scraps down into 1-3 yard pieces.

TIP: If you have a huge amount of one kind of thread and a small project, just pull off a half dozen 3 yard pieces of the ball(s) you have a lot of.

4. Take a piece of thread and start off a ball. When you get close to the end, tie on a new, different thread and continue rolling. Rinse and repeat as needed (kidding on the rinse part) until you reach the necessary yardage. (Still remember what it is? See, told you to write it down ;-D)

TIP: Start with your heaviest weight yarn and double or triple up on the thinner weights to match it.

Wanna up the funk factor? Work in some specialty yarns that may be too expensive to get more than one skein. Use some nice ribbon in one of the doubled/trebled areas. Throw in some embroidery floss you have left over--satin or smooth or even metallic.