Friday, April 30, 2010

Frugal Fridays: Dirt Cheap Yarn


Admittedly, I am not a knitter. But, I recently heard a fantastic story from my college roommate, who was visiting with her husband. Apparently my roommate's mother-in-law peruses the racks at a deep-discount retailer which sells imperfect or security-ink-stained clothing; essentially one level below the likes of Ross or TJMaxx. She is not shopping for clothing - she's shopping for yarn in the clothing racks.

Since size or small imperfections are no hurdles, she can pick up knit sweaters for pennies on the dollar, whereupon she returns home and unravels the sweaters. (If it were me doing this, I'd totally do it while watching reruns of my favorite show...) SO, as I understand it, she is essentially getting entire skeins' worth of yarn for a buck or two per skein, which she uses to knit hats and mittens. (Compare this with buying yarn at the craft store, where even with a sale or coupon the yarn could cost around $4-5 per skein.)

I am pretty sure my jaw had hit the floor by the time my roommate had finished telling me about this practice of her mother-in-law's. Once I'd fully absorbed the story, I said, "With your permission, I'd like to blog this..." :)

If you were a person who was very crafty with knitting winter accessories, especially for rapidly-growing kids who were only going to use them for a few months, this could be an extremely frugal way to go about it!
Frugal Fridays: Dirt Cheap YarnSocialTwist Tell-a-Friend
Ebates and Swagbucks are both easy ways to earn rewards while doing what you normally do - web-searching through Google and shopping for bargains online!

4 comments:

Olivia said...

What a great idea! Maybe some day when I knit again, I'll use it! (And maybe I'll share it with my mom who's a fantastic knitter!)
suchakingdom.blogspot.com

Mom2fur said...

That's a great idea, although I'm not sure I'd be that patient, LOL! I think I might give it a try next time I hit the thrift store and see a sweater in a pretty color that is either badly made or the wrong size. Yarn that's been knitted or crocheted already would have a 'texture' to it and would make something really nice, I think.

Niki Jolene said...

That is a super idea! Sweaters are uber cheap right now at all the thrift shops.

:)

Unknown said...

Your site is very helpful. I travel for my job so I don't have as much time for coupons. With your blog I am able to get my grocery list done in no time and still be smart about saving.