With the cost of living continuing to rise, and wages not really increasing much to reflect that, many people have been forced to do more hard budgeting in order to save money, and hobbies tend to be one of the first things to get cut from the list of expenses. In the interests of saving money and making sure we've got enough money for rent and groceries, sometimes we have to cut back on novels, games, or craft supplies, leaving people disappointed and frustrated that their once-enjoyed hobbies are no longer so easy to come by or to enjoy. While prioritizing is a good idea, it doesn't seem fair that we should have to cut back enjoyment just to eat, especially in the modern western world.

This doesn't have to be the case. With a little ingenuity and creativity, you can find low-cost substitutes for your old higher-cost hobby supplies. Your entertainment can continue, at less than half the price that it used to. Now, I can't speak for every hobby supply in existance here, but I can certainly give advice on yarn.

One of the greatest attributes of humanity is our adaptability.

Time for a little bit of personal history. I'm a knitter on a rather tight budget. Not as tight as it could be, thankfully, but I still can't afford to go to my local yarn store each week and come home with a sweater's worth of brand-name yarn, the way some people can. It bothered me for a while, seeing all the wonderful fibres that other people were getting to knit with, like wool, cashmere, and alpaca, while I was stuck with plentiful -- and cheap -- acrylic yarn. What was I to do?

It was shortly after I started to get annoyed with this situation that I found an article on how to recycle yarn from sweaters. It seemed simple enough. It was a little bit more work than just got to the yarn store and buying yarn in the skein, but the cost difference more than made up for that.

For example, I could get a wool sweater at a thrift store for about $5. I could unravel that yarn (using the tutorial linked below) and come away with enough yarn to knit myself 3 or 4 scarves and a hat, if I chose. Or I could go to my local yarn store and spend $50 or more for the same amount of yarn.

The decision was easy.

Now, I'm not trying to say that yarn stores overprice their products. Yarn can be expensive, certainly, but a lot of work tends to go into making it. Just in regards to wool, there's the cost of raising the sheep, shearing them, carding the wool, spinning it into yarn, dyeing it, shipping it to the store... There are a lot of people to be paid along the way, and I don't begrudge yarn stores trying to make a bit of profit from the products they're selling. That isn't what I'm trying to say here.

But for me, paying that kind of money just wasn't an option. I simply didn't have the money to spend. If I wanted good yarn, good fibres that aren't made from petroleum byproduct, I would have to go elsewhere.

Thrift stores are probably the best place to hunting for good sweaters to ravel back into yarn again. There you will find a wide variety of different colours and fibres just waiting to be turned into something that somebody will enjoy. The prices are generally low, too. Depending on which store you go to and in which area, you can find a sweater from anywhere between $1-5, which will usually yield about 1 pound of good usable yarn once you're done taking it apart.

Thrift stores are good at giving clothing a second chance at life, but whatever doesn't sell after a certain amount of time gets tossed out in the trash, and goes straight to the same place the rest of your garbage goes. Dumps, landfills, all those places that are a blight to the eyes and an offense to the nose. Where is the sense in throwing out good yarn that can, with a little work, be turned into something that you or a loved one will wear and enjoy? Just because the sweater itself may be ugly as sin doesn't mean it can't be turned back into something beautiful and cherished.

You may see things that are in such good condition that you might wonder why anyone would throw something like it away. And because the price is so low and the quality is so good, you may be fooled into thinking that there must be something wrong with it that you can't see. This is almost never the case. People take their clothing to second-hand stores for a multitude of reasons, and one of those reasons is, "I don't like it." Maybe the sweater fit great but was a colour that they didn't like. It may have been a bit too big or small to look flattering on the owner. The price is low because that's the average price the store charges. It doesn't neccesarily indicate the quality of the product.

So why do people sit on the fence at all? Why not just buy everything from the thrift store and do that extra work for your yarn? It's certainly cost effective.

Some people prefer the bragging rights or saying they can afford and thus bought some expensive designer yarn. Other people prefer letting others do the initial work for them, and they'll enjoy the final product. Some people are brand-loyal, and prefer to support certain companies or stores from which they get their yarn. All of those reasons are valid ones.

But for those who have decided to get their yarn from thrift store sweaters, the biggest concern in this is now quality. But, as with brand names, not all yarns are equal, and quality is and should be a concern.

The myth of quality is widespread, and yes, I do mean 'myth'. Plenty of people have the opinion that because something has been used before, it is inferior to something that has never been used. In some cases, this may be true, but not always. Depending on the yarn you're trying to recycle (and as with anything you do, you'll get more discerning at choosing what to buy with practise), it may be just as high quality as something you'd be in a yarn store. Just different. Unique, too, since you're not likely to see this same yarn anywhere else.

One of the most common issues I hear people voice about recycled yarn is that the yarn is curly, and thus isn't easy to knit with. Yes, the yarn does come out kinky and wavy when you ravel it. This comes from being held in one position for so long. But that doesn't make it hard to knit with. There are ways to straighten wavy yarn, but that's a subject for another article. The point I'm trying to make here is that even if the yarn may be a little bit kinky, it's no more difficult to knit with than a commercial yarn. The scarf in the picture above was knit with recycled yarn that I didn't straighten beforehand, and it turned out just fine. I had no problems with tension, the shape of the stitches was even. People who have this concern tend to forget that you're usually holding the yarn when you knit with it, and stretching it out a bit as you knit or crochet it into a garment. This takes care of the kinks well enough. Broken ends can be woven in when you're finished making whatever it is you're making.

Knitting with recycled yarn won't be exactly like knitting with a commercial yarn. As I've stated, there is the added work of turning the sweater back into yarn in the first place, and winding or rolling it into balls to make it easier to work with. But if you're budget-minded, you'll find the extra work is worth it in the long run, and you'll still be able to enjoy your old hobbies that may have to be abandoned otherwise.

There are so many options with yarn, too, and the low cost seems to encourage experimentation. Experiment with things like dyeing if you find something that's a horrible colour but feels lovely, or new techniques that sound a little tricky. Even if the yarn gets ruined, it didn't cost very much, and a lesson was learned.