Crafting a Green World

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Cashmere. The epitome of luxury.

Are you like me in that you’ve seen cashmere yarn in the store, balked at the price tag and thought to yourself “I’ll never try that.”? Well I’m here to give a little prodding to say that its ok to splurge. It’s time to give cashmere a chance. Yes it is expensive but the fiber itself; my god is it soft!

Cashmere fiber comes from a specific type of goat, bred to produce soft downy hairs. And just like with Musk Ox, these goats can be combed for the luxury fiber and then spun into yarn. What is created is a soft, fine and yummy fiber that is irresistible. For fiber fanatics it is impossible to keep your hands off it.

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Not too long ago, I did a thorough de-sash of my yarn pile so I could better utilize the yarn I had in my stash. Some I got rid of through an online swap and the rest I donated to Craft Mutiny’s Craft Supply Swap, a swap very similar to the Crafters Anonymous Craft Swap. After all the yarn was cleaned out, I rediscovered a bag of soft green yarn, that I think my mother had given to me.

I started looking it over and knew that it was the right weight for my next project. I wanted to start knitting with it right away, so I pulled out a skein and pulled the tag off of it to start winding it into a ball. That’s when I noticed the label had a Forest Stewardship Council certification stamp. Wow, a yarn that’s been FSC certified?! My lucky day!

The yarn in question was Bernat brand yarn made from soy of their Natural Blends collection. Bernat offers soy yarn in 8 soft soothing colors. A great compliment to the soft yarn. I happen to have Celery, but it comes in Seasalt, Raspberry, Oatmeal and Flax.

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KusiKuy Clothing Company is so much more than its name implies. KusiKuy was founded in 1997 by Tamara Stenn, a Peace Corps Volunteer who was inspired by the idea of fair trade and what it meant for local indigenous populations.

KusiKuy specializes in warm alpaca yarn from Bolivia. All of their yarns are hand spun and made from the fibers of the alpaca which remote, nomadic communities tend. Their company is culturally sensitive and respects the culture and ceremony of the animals that these communities keep.

They sell a wide range of weights of the yarn, which is a strong, durable fiber, perfect for the Bolivian climate and indigenous to the area. It comes in over 25 different natural colors, perfect for accessories and socks. KusiKuy does not sell their yarn to yarn stores, and instead caters to the home crafter and small business crafter. Many socks and hats are created from their yarn.

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A little while back Skye told us about Recycled and Fair Trade Beads and gave us a lot of good suggestions as to where to find them. One on her list was Ecobutterfly, an online shop dedicated to crafting and the environment. Among the recycled glass beads, Ecobutterfly also offers a wonderful array of organic yarns.

Inspired by her Grandmother, Stephanie, the owner of Ecobutterfly, has pursued knitting and yarn with en eye to the environment. Ecobutterfly stocks yarns that are not only organic but also fair trade. She offers Peruvian Flamme Cotton Yarn, Eco-Rainbow Lace Organic Cotton Yarn, Fine Hemp Yarn, Kusikuy Organic Cotton Yarn (more on them later), Monarch Organic Cotton Yarn and Pakucho Organic Cotton Yarn. This shop is an eco-yarn lovers dream!

All the yarns are vegan, plant based organic and either come in their natural color or dyed using vegetable dyes or low impact dyes. The stock also represents a wide range of weights from chunky to lace weight; offering something for every knitter.

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Don’t forget! The next Carnival of Green Crafts will be August 9th at BlogHer. Send in your submissions now.

It’s not often that you come across a different type of fiber found in your yarn. There are only so many animal (alpaca, bison, musk ox, etc.) and plant (linen, cotton, etc.) based yarns. So I was pleasantly surprised when I happened upon tencel.

Tencel is made from wood pulp that is spun down to make the fiber. The process boasts environmental claims as the pulp that is harvested comes from tree farms that are continuously replanted and the spinning process uses non-toxic solvents.

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Inspired by the first Carnival of Green Crafts and Yoel’s attempt at stashbusting I took a closer look at my yarn stash and encourage you to do the same.

There’s a reason you bought all that yarn in the first place, right? I know there is a plethora of your very own yearn worthy yarn, just sitting in your house waiting to be picked up and turned into an amazing project. Whether its a sturdy cotton blend, a fancy novelty yarn, or any one of the numerous environmentally friendly yarns we like to tell you about, your stash is a wonderful wealth of fiber. So use it!

Consumption is a sometimes tricky issue to tackle, because no one wants to be told that we buy too much stuff. But we do and we need to be doing less. Earlier this month I had the chance to hear Diane MacEachern, author of Big Green Purse speak on her book, consumption and purchasing power.

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Ah silk. It is such a luxurious fiber; cool and soft to the touch. It has an unmistakable feel that you always know when something is made of silk.

To become the silk that we know and love, this fiber has a very interesting story.

Silk comes from the cocoon of the Bombyx moth. Before turning into a moth the Bombyx caterpillar spins itself a cocoon of 1000 yards of silky fiber to house itself during the transformation. The caterpillar secretes a substance that is a thin but strong strand of fiber, which is what we know as silk.

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–Don’t forget! Send in your posts for the new Carnival of Green Crafts. Taking submissions now.–

I know that we’ve covered hemp yarn before from Lanaknits and Autumn talked to us about macrame , but it was Leslie’s quest to try natural dye that got me to take a second look at Aurora Silk’s Hemp Yarn.

At first look this yarn from Aurora brings to mind all the stereotypes that Skye talked about when she profiled hemp fabrics. But no it is Not Marijuana.

Hemp yarn is derived from the growth of industrial hemp, a different species of it’s more famous cousin. Industrial hemp grows fast without the need for much pesticides or herbicides. The fiber harvested from the plant is more commonly known as bast. Bast fibers are long and very strong and can be woven or spun to make fabric, rope or yarn.

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I think I have an obsession for bulky yarns. Especially yarn that is hand spun and hand dyed with fantastic color ways. I find myself lusting over the most heavy and super bulky yarns in the hottest dog days of summer; a time when I’m supposed to be knitting and thinking only about lightweight yarns and projects so I won’t sweat to death. But when I came across Crafty Yarn, the shop just fed my obsession and I needed to learn more.

Most of Crafty Yarn’s bulky weight yarns are hand spun recycled yarn made from mill ends and scrap fiber. The other available skeins are made from reclaimed sweaters that have been frogged for their yarn. An avid knitter and recycler, Molly Bachelor, owner of Crafty Yarn, was interested in material reuse and doing something that was about the hand made process. She had always loved fiber and working with it so she learned how to spin and started to sell her recycled yarn a little over a year a go.

Finding good quality sweaters is key for Bachelor. Sourcing much of her material from large clearance centers and thrift stores, she is mostly drawn to natural fibers; especially wool. If a synthetic fiber is of particular interest she will buy it and “if it’s cashmere, I’ll grab it,” she said. She searches for fiber by sorting by type then looks to the sweater’s construction since she deconstructs it for reuse. She ends up with only about 5 to 10 percent of what she originally picks out.

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My pick for a sustainable, green, yearn worthy-ness yarn for this week is a plant fiber. Yup plant, not animal like yak or quivit or just plain old sheep.

This week I’ve been hunting down linen.

Linen is that elusive fiber that I sometimes come across in interesting summertime knitting patterns for open weave shirts, tunics and shawls. I always make a mental note of it, thinking, huh linen. But I’ve never actually made anything with it.

Linen itself is harvested from the flax plant which produces long and strong fibers known as linen. It has a natural luster and is found in creamy white to tan and can easily be dyed other colors. It is mostly known for bedding and towels made from the strong fabric that is created when the linen is woven.

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