Project Thoughts (Material) — Lucynda N. Scheffer

There are a lot of things I think about when I start a project.

I tend to work in cheap acrylic yarns from big box stores, which some of the more purist crafters find abhorrent. I like metal needles rather than bamboo; I count rows on a notepad instead of a fancy clicker. My patterns are sketched out in margins on scrap paper, working off of things I already know how to make. I’m about as much of a purist as I am a wheel of cheese, which is to say I’m not much of either at all.

I have no real preference between my yarncrafts. Right now I crochet a lot, because the patterns are simple and easy, and work up quickly. I do fine lacework in knitting, which requires more concentration, but that’s only because I’ve knitted for longer and have more confidence in my skills. I do have hand-dyed and hand-spun laceweight yarn for those delicate projects, but for a baby blanket? Cheap acrylic yarn all the way.

Why? A couple of reasons. It’s sturdy yarn, not prone to breakage. It comes in bright colors, suitable for a nursery. Bernat Softee is easily found, and I can order it in bulk online or in bundles at AC Moore, and I know I’ll have consistent color and quality, and enough to finish a project of indeterminate size. Most importantly: acrylic yarn can be machine-washed. Have you ever spent an hour with an infant? It’ll take them ten minutes to pee, poop, and vomit all over your precious, delicate lacework, and I for one don’t want those germs to hang around in the fibers if you have to hand wash cold. Boil the thing, lay it flat to try, and you have a clean baby blanket. Acrylic will fuzz a little, but it won’t totally felt or shrink dramatically.

It’s a useful thing, acyrlic yarn. Maybe cotton is more natural, or wool better at keeping in warmth. Acyrlic, though–that’ll endure. I want my projects to be useful, my designs to be safe, the things I make lasting. My oldest niece still has the blanket I made her, eight years later. Her sister has hers as well; I can’t tell you how many washings they’ve been through, and they’re still soft and bright.

If I’m doing something decorative, something beautiful–my graduation shawl, for one–I’ll dip into softer wool and brighter cotton. That’s not something that has to hold up, that’s something whose sole purpose is to exist.

I don’t know if people think about why I chose the yarn I do. It’s not because it’s cheap, necessarily, though that is a college-student factor. It’s primarily because it’s more useful. That’s all I really want my projects to be, really: used, and useful.

This is part of a series on yarncraft written for a nonfiction class at George Mason University. It's being crossposted here for archival reasons.

Original publish date: 19 September 2017, on bittyknittygritty.wordpress.com