Thrifty Crochet

After having some severe anxiety over the social media problem, and being forced to give up my Mastodon account, which I really loved, I'm going to take a break from blogging for some much needed self-care. See you when I'm ready to brave being online again. Image by Enrique from Pixabay

The second half of my latest order from Hobbii just arrived. Three more big cakes of Tea Time XL in Rooibos, and a ball of their Cotton Silk in Misty Green. Here's everything I ordered all together. The ten packs of acrylic work out to be about eighty-one cents a skein, which beats dollar store yarn; they will join three other packs I've gotten and eventually turn into a bed-size blanket. I got a bulk discount on the Tea Time XL, which I've been building a stock of for a cardigan I want to make. The Cotton Silk I ordered just out of curiosity; I'm going to test that for the blog. The Fantasy bulky weight will likely become a scarf and hat for next winter, although I'm still thinking of what I want to do with that. One reason I invested in another hanging organizer was to sort and display my new yarns for projects. I've got the rest of the year covered now.

The title of this post and the embroidery on this mini quilt I made last year are the same: jasin-eul salanghaseo . It's a Korean phrase that has very deep meaning for me. It came to me during a terrible time as a gentle wake-up call, and became a motto for this time in my life. It empowered me like no one and nothing else in my life has. What does it mean? The literal translation in English if you google it is "I love you" but the actual meaning is "love yourself." In the past I have always attracted people who do not actually care for me. They have told me they do care so they could use me, abuse me, swindle me out of money and otherwise gratify themselves at my expense. I'm not sure why they behave that way, but that was my heaviest burden. I have done my part by being naive, believing what they told me, hoping it would get better, and even thinking at times that I deserved to be treated that way. I had no one to protect me. Much of thi...

I thought while I was getting cranberry juice at our local Dollar Tree that I'd see what they had in the craft department for crochet. I like their Premier "Just" yarns and I wouldn't mind trying a few more varieties. I also saw Elise Rose's recent video where she took a trip to hers and found a bag of plastic crochet hooks. Alas, all they had tool-wise at my store was a lone pair of knitting needles. My store also got a remodel a couple of weeks ago and the craft aisle has downsized a bit. They have some new products, like this diamond art key chain kit, but a lot of the craft wood and fabric has disappeared. I found one bigger diamond art kit that was kind of pretty, but I really don't need another new project this month! Finally I looked over the yarn. The section is about the same size, but all the Just Tweed I wanted to try is gone. They have chenille, worsted, some kind of faux fur and a new addition, small skeins of Red Heart worst...

There were three lots of nice yarn at the online auction that I let myself bid on, but only for $10.00 max each. This small lot of yarn and kits quickly attracted a lot of bidders, and in the end went to one of them for $21.00. This jumbled mess lot with a case of both knitting and crochet vintage needles, but it wasn't to be mine. The final bid came in at $11.99. This gigantic lot has no labels and is a bit of a tangled mess, but someone else thought enough of it to outbid me for $11.00 -- so they can untangle it. Am I sorry I didn't win any of the three lots? Nope. That's just how it goes when you stick to your guns. I have more luck at the brick and mortar thrift stores these days anyway. Image credit: all the images in this post came from the original auction listings at ShopGoodwill.com.

To take advantage of some sales, reward myself for a tough beginning to Spring, and try some new-to-me yarns, I placed an order with Hobbii, and the first part of it arrived last week. Let's see what they sent me. In this shipment I got two ten packs of their We Heart Acrylic in white and beach (I love the name!), four skeins of their Fantasy acrylic in herbs and spices, and two balls of their Friends cotton silk in light gray and cornflower. These are the two yarns I've not yet tried, so I'll be reviewing these on the blog.

My friend B sent me this package of Lpalats Long Distance Cake Ball yarn to review on the blog, and promised me it would be "fun." That worried me a bit, as B and I have very different ideas of what's fun, but okay. From what I could suss out on Amazon this yarn evidently comes from China, but that's all the information I have for the brand and manufacture. Like most Chinese yarns there aren't a lot of details. The cotton/acrylic blend yarn comes in four "cake balls" of 3.5 oz./100 grams, and contains 220 meters/240.5 yards of yarn. That's a lot. The colors are a creamy light yellow, a soft green and a light aqua in a gradient that looks like it will shift well. There are eight color gradients to choose from on the product listing page. The four skeins came with two crochet hooks, but both seemed a bit big for the yarn, so I put those aside and went with a 4.5mm for the foundation row and a 4mm for the yarn. The cakes were air compr...

Last week I decided to take a break and play with this skein of Red Heart Super Saver Pink Camo I got in that excellent BIN Bundle lot. The colors intrigued me, as I've never tried a camo yarn before. I wondered how the color shifts and repeat would work out. I also wanted to try out these pompom makers from that loom set I got in my brick and mortar mega thrift. I've never used these things, and they seem like fun. That's why after watching a very helpful pompom making video tutorial I made this little basket and these three pompoms, using up almost the entire skein. I like camo yarn well enough; the shifts are interesting and the final result is pretty. The pompom makers will come in handy, especially when I start making more bunnies, winter hats and gift wrapping trims.

There is a lot of nice yarn going up for auction lately, and I've caved into my curiosity and looked around the site to get an idea of the prices and how the bidding is going. Competition is very fierce for basically every decent yarn lot, but there are still a few gems the snipers and resellers seem to be ignoring. I let myself bid on three, but only for $10.00 each. Take this small lot of yarn and kits -- it had no bidders until I put in mine. There appears to be a sock kit, as well as a mystery bag from Annie's along with some interesting yarn. It's worth ten bucks to me to find out what's in that bag. :) Jumbled mess lots generally don't get any bids, but I see some interesting yarns in this one, too. The case in the front has both knitting and crochet vintage needles in it. KnitPal Wool Wonders is very soft yarn, too. I'd buy this at a brick and mortar for ten bucks, so I bid. I have a chance to win this gigantic lot for my ten buck bid be...

I decided to document everything I do in one day. I was curious about how much I get accomplished (more than I thought.) I also never really think about how busy I am. It's just life. If you'd like to know the details, and you're not easily bored, you can walk through 17 hours of April 15th with me via this photo album here .

I rarely mention on the blog the things I thrift that are not yarn, such as my clothes. I thrift 99.9% of my wardrobe, and that includes a pajama shorts set for $8.99. It's Alice in Wonderland, and has the word Sweetie emblazoned on the shirt, but I'm just going to sleep in it. :) A comparable set at Wal-Mart (and this is the very cheapest sort) now costs $16.98 new. For $5.99 each I scored two bags of hundreds of fabric strips, which included five packages of binding. It's enough to make a good-size throw quilt. This will save me time (and hand pain) when I sew a new patchwork pattern I've been wanting to try. Finally, and this is not the best photo, I bought a wood framed ceramic tile for my kitchen, not to display but to rest hot pots on as I transfer their contents to serving dishes. That protects my counters. The trivet was $3.99, but I got it for half off at $2.00.

Last week I decided to use the buy it now option to purchase this yarn and floss lot at the online thrift auction for $19.95 several reasons. Primarily it has yarn I need for some upcoming projects, including a hard to find Bernat yarn. That used up the rest of my thrift budget for April and a few bucks more, but I wasn't trying not to spend this month. I'm going out thrifting this weekend, too, so I expect to spend again. I'll just have to tough it out. :) I had a very good feeling about this lot, and not just because I got it for a very decent price. I've already thrifted one skein of that black/gray/white striped Bernat blanket yarn, and it retails for $14.99. As for the rest, it looked to me as if it was definitely worth $5.00 per skein resale, or $119.99. I counted 22 skeins of yarn in the listing pic for this bundle (it's a pile, so I knew there might be more), and that made the price I paid break down to about ninety-one cents per skein. In contras...

Let's talk some more about how to estimate the value of yarn lots you can thrift online before you place a bid. Here's a nice lot of 30 Red Heart Super Saver skeins that has an opening bid of $15.75. This is where you do simple math. $15.75 divided by 30 is .525 cents. Now, if the winner lands this lot for the minimum bid, and the shipping is another $20.00, that brings the total cost up to $35.75. That's still $1.19 per skein. Red Heart Super Saver retails for $4.49, and Jumbo runs about $7.99 now. So Let's say you get 27 regular skeins, and 3 Jumbo. These would cost you $145.20 to buy new. Small yarn lots can have value, too, and they're a bit easier to price if they have the labels, but you need to watch the cost of shipping. There were 11 total skeins in this lot (four are not pictured in the opening listing shot) and I estimated them to be worth $38.27 retail. The opening bid on this lot is $8.99, but shipping is probably going to be anywher...

While we were down in the city last week I asked my guy to stop by a Michael's Craft Store a few miles away, as I needed a couple things I had to see in person. I have not shopped at a craft store since JoAnn closed, and I thought I'd look at their new yarn prices. Hooboy. Everything in the yarn section was SO expensive! $14.99 for these Caron cakes (I thrifted two latte cakes for less than a dollar a cake last year.) I don't know how anyone can afford new yarn. Wool Ease is now up to $9.99 a skein. That's crazy. I thrifted three skeins a couple months ago in a big bag of yarn for five bucks. Even the clearance yarn was $7.00 per skein or higher. I'm sorry, but I just can't justify spending that kind of money on it. What did I get while I was there, you may ask? Not much, and no yarn. This bunny basket was marked down 70% and was still $7.99 (original price $24.99) but I splurged because I like it. I found three chains I needed for ...

I took a couple days to test out another of the sport weight silk yarns I got from Darn Good Yarn, and learned quite a bit about working with this beautiful fiber. The first thing I crocheted with it was a no-pattern pocket for my purse-size hand creams. I have extremely dry skin, especially on my hands, so I'm constantly using hand creams. The little black tops sometimes unscrew and come off while the tube is getting jostled around in my purse, so I thought a button-up pocket would prevent that. As with the Gumdrop silk yarn Icicle was lovely to work with, and made a pretty pocket for my hand cream. I can fit two inside! Ha. I also crocheted the yarn in single crochet stitches in the round to see how it worked with a tighter project. The mug rug for my office desk came out fine, and I had no problem with the yarn, although the stitches in any sport weight yarn are small and hard to see. The smaller the yarn, the more noticeable the increases are, too. ...