Yarn Snobbery

I will admit that I like to knit with nice yarn.   There is no point in knitting with yarn that will create a rag no matter how skilled (or not) the work the knitter puts out.   Does that have to be expensive yarn?  Not really.

Willow Yarns  and Knitpicks are great examples of inexpensive yarns that knit up beautifully.    Right now I am knitting a throw out of Willow's Burrow Bulky.    Burrow has the same put up as Plymouth Encore, has truly lovely colors, and a really nice hand.    I have a small stockpile of this yarn for projects that are in queue.   I have completed a couple of projects in Willow Daily.   Both of these are sweaters for little girls.

I was very happy with the way that these sweaters turned out.   The receivers loved them as well.   The green sweater would have looked much nicer if I had machine washed it and dried it.  It really needed to be handled that way.  I learned my lesson so the brightly colored one didn't have that wrinkled look.

One of the reasons I like to knit with the less expensive yarn is that I feel more able to take risks.   I can experiment with ideas, rip out what I don't like, re-knit, and rip until I have things right without worrying about what I am doing to very expensive yarn.  With this freedom, I learn a lot.

Another reason is that the less expensive yarn lines tend to have more "wash and wear" yarns.    When I am knitting for children with two working parents, I try not to send garments that have to be coddled for fear those garments will become garments that will not be worn.   If I send something that does not get used, I don't send anything else to that household.   I want the sweaters, hats, socks or whatever worn until they are worn out.   That is what those things are for.

When I can, I do like to knit with high end yarns.   Just like I don't eat Godiva every time I eat chocolate, I don't need to use Jade Sapphire every time I knit.