Honestly, Nope

I considered donating to our local church thrift store the bag of macrame cord that I received in my Lion Brand mystery order. I'm not a fan of bulky yarn, and this cord looked like very ropey stuff that would fray if I breathed hard on it (which in hindsight makes me wonder if I am psychic.)

That said, I was also curious as to why the company would consider something like this as an acceptable substitute for a skein of yarn (I ordered three mystery skeins, and I received two skeins of yarn and this bag.) I also thought the skeins were too small to be useful for anyone who did make macrame.

Since I'm a waste-not want-not kind of gal at heart, I sat down last Saturday night determined to use it. The simplest way would be to make a basket. This is the point when my very religious neighbor would say "And Jesus wept."

I'm a kinda-sorta Buddhist, so this is when Buddha would have wept. :)

There were twelve 1.5 oz. skeins in the bag, about equal in weight to six skeins of ordinary yarn. The colors were attractive in a muted sort of palette. They did not feel especially nice to touch; more like clothesline cord than anything.

Each skein had 19 yards of cord, not very much to work with; I knew I didn't have enough to make a full size of Jayda InStitches' big beautiful basket. I was also surprised to see the skeins described as "sample balls" on the label. 19 yards is a sample? Okay.

Using the recommended 10 mm hook, I started with the darkest color, black. The cord was very over-twisted, and I spent a lot of time untwisting the cord as I worked to eliminate bunching and snarls. That revealed how incohesive the cord is. I was a little dismayed by how it split and broke; the cord is made up of thirty or so very thin cotton fiber strands that constantly tangled and even snapped individually when I gently stressed it. They also unraveled (sometimes it really did seem like when I breathed hard on them) because there was nothing holding the cord together but a bit of twisting (which I was perpetually untwisting to get rid of the kinks.)

I've only ever encountered braided macrame cord, but I did a Google search on macrame cord images and apparently this many-stranded cotton is a common type of cord that they use. You poor things!

One skein did not last long as you can see here. I decided to keep crocheting and using up each sample ball, stopping only when I ran out of cord.

I am a big believer in doing what I can to deal with whatever life brings my way. Difficulty is an unavoidable part of existence, but we learn more from it than when everything goes perfectly. How we deal with our negative experiences helps us as life becomes progressively more and more difficult, as it is now at this stage in my existence. This is why I do things like this -- not because I'm a masochist. :)

It was slow going and quite difficult to keep the cord under control. I constantly had to frog back stitches that became unraveled and snarled in the making (and it doesn't like to be frogged, either.) Even weaving in the ends when I did a color change was a headache. On the label the manufacturer printed "Macrame, crochet, knit. Save the planet." It's nice that they made these cords out of recycled cotton; I'm a big fan of recycled fibers.

Only if Lion Brand honestly believes this cord is a viable Super Bulky yarn substitute that can be crocheted and knitted (I'm shuddering just imagining casting on this cord) then they need to make all their employees work with this product for one night. They will change their minds.

I worked my way through all of the cord skeins, and ended up with this half-ish basket. It was borderline exhausting, but I got it done in one night. The sides don't stand up on their own as they would had I used yarn, so I had to put yarn in the basket to take pics.

I'm glad I did this, if for no other reason than to promise myself I will never again use unbraided macrame cord. Bottom line, I cannot recommend this product for crochet or knitting (unless you really are a masochist, then this is your dream fiber.)