I applaud your scientific method.

As is virtually always the case with her videos, this one is very informative and helpful.l I would add, though, that there is a very important component not addressed--that being what fiber the yarn is. Re-knitting yarn is something I do quite regularly and in doing so I've noticed a major difference in what I need to do to get the results I want, depending on whether the yarn is animal fiber or plant based. I've had very little difficulty re-knitting animal fiber yarns without reclaiming them, although winding them back into a ball does provide a less kinky yarn. On the other hand, if the yarn is plant based, I get much nicer looking results if I reclaim it before re-knitting it. That does make sense since plant based yarn is not as elastic as animal fiber. Sort of for the same reason I've noticed that plant fiber yarns tend to row out more noticeably than do animal fiber yarns. One more comment that has nothing to do with the actual subject of this video and that is the swatches she is showing are NOT gauge swatches. To provide any level of accuracy regarding stitches per inch, the swatches would be without any borders and at least 6-inch if not 8-inch squares. I include this because experience leads me to believe gauge swatching is more misunderstood than almost any part of knitting.

Thank you for taking the time to conduct this experiment and sharing your findings. Results were very interesting and super useful to my future knitting ( as I find myself frequently frogging 😩). As always, you rock and I look forward to every Technique Tuesday!

I love love love videos like this. Anything that combines my scientific side with my newly discovered crafty one is always a dream and this is the sort of video that makes me bounce in my seat like an impatient toddler! LOL Thank you so much for doing this - I've only ever unravelled and reused yarn pretty much straight away, certainly within a couple of days at most, and so any kink has been minimal. But I think absolutely that this information is going to be helpful if I make something larger or want to reclaim yarn months or years down the line.

I like how methodical you were with this, explaining what different scenarios might mean and what is the best way to proceed in each. Thanks, that must have taken a lot of time and effort.

Thank you for today’s technique Tuesday, very interesting and enlightening. I’ve had success by steaming 100% wool with my steam iron. I ravelled a piece of knitting, I’d previously set aside for nearly 6 months. I was impatient and didn’t want to spend the time soaking and waiting for the yarn to dry. Instead I decided to form a kinky coil over half the length of my ironing board. Using the steam button on my iron (I have a steam station so can generate plenty of steam) I was able to remove the kinks to a point where the yarn looked very similar to your ravelled Swatch B. The yarn began to relax immediately upon the steam being applied. As the yarn on top relaxed I slowly moved it to the side to reveal the still slightly kinky yarn underneath and continued to steam. The iron was kept at least two inches from the surface of the yarn. It took a surprisingly short amount of time to for the entire coil to ‘unkink’, approximately 5 mins. I left the yarn to dry on the ironing board and from memory it was ready to use within a few hours.

@RoxanneRichardson

5 жыл бұрын

I had thought about seeing how my steam iron would do. It would be quicker than boiling a pot of water, I would guess! It's so satisfying to see that kinky yarn relax. :-)

What a great experiment! I learned a lot and am not so afraid now of re-using yarn I've frogged. Thanks.

Very interesting experiment! It’s amazing what one can learn when frogging yarn! Thanks for sharing!

What a great video. You went to so much work to do this, that’s amazing. Thank you for all the great videos you do, I’ve watched many of them as I’ve been learning to knit in the past few months. I do wish I had seen it a week ago when I went to shorten my son’s double sided hat by 2 cm. I frogged it back to 2cm after the crown decreases, so roughly 30 rows, which was a good amount of yarn. He had been wearing the hat for a month and it had been blocked. So the yarn was super kinky. The yarn was fingering 70% alpaca 30% wool. I tried reknitting with it at first but it was terrible. So then I wrapped the yarn around pins on my blocking boards (size of my table) and I steamed it with my steamer (the yarn was still attached to the hat). It took very little time to dry (maybe an hour at most). It came out perfectly straight, same as new and knit up beautifully. Once the hat was blocked again, you could not tell at all where I reknit it.

@RoxanneRichardson

5 жыл бұрын

It sounds like you solved the problem on your own, and learned a lot in the process!

@pkp6241

5 жыл бұрын

I did, I was quite excited I learned something new. I told my son to not expect much but was so happy with the finished product.

This is very interesting and also helpful in recycling used yarn. Great topic for a group conversation. Thank you for sharing. Respectfully, Donna K

I love experiments like these, they are fantastic to watch and learn from, please do more!

Great experiment , I am knitting a cardigan and had to rip out a sleeve (did not like the way it looked, it had been washed and blocked and knitted for a couple of weeks) , I used a method like Suzanne Bryan recommends and ripped it all out (it was very kinky, 74% wool, 25% viscose ) I soaked it for 20 minutes after winding it up in a ball, squeezed all the water out, I then took a hard piece of cardboard and strung it around the cardboard and let it dry for a couple of days, it has turned out fine as I am now re-knitting it. Thank you for the tutorial Roxanne! Now I know I wouldn't necessarily have to do that in every instance.

@RoxanneRichardson

5 жыл бұрын

It's always great to have options, because there is typically more than one way to get to the same end point.

This was amazing. Thanks so much for the attention to detail!

This is so helpful!! I recently frogged a not-quite-finished sweater that had been sitting for several years, and I’ve been really stressing about exactly the right way to get it perfectly smooth again. This video really calmed down my perfectionism, and now I know my biggest issue is just going to be washing out the dust from where the bag wasn’t fully closed lol. Thank you so much for such a thorough experiment and video!!

This morning I carried out a similar experiment, although not as exhaustive as yours. I bought some Norwegian wool from ebay. Someone had obviously tried to do some colour work, given up and rewound in tight balls. About 25% of the yarn was very crinkly. I rewound on my ball winder a while back to relax from the hard ,tight balls, and then last night wound some of the colour into a skein, washed it gently, towelled and hung up overnight to dry. This morning, I have knitted some virgin yarn, I needed to find gauge anyway, and then knitted some of the washed yarn. The latter is slightly uneven but still the same gauge. There is still a lot of " crinkled " yarn to skein and wash but your video has persuaded me to wash rather than steam which I had intended to try. Thank you for your very interesting and informative videos.

That was fascinating! Thank you for doing this experiment.

What a timely experiment! I’m knitting a pair of socks and managed to knit half the second one on 2.5mm needles, rather than 3mm. Doh! They looked sufficiently different that I had to re-start the second. I remembered your recent discussions about the pros and cons of frogging. I’m using gradient yarn and the second sock was a fraternal twin (because I had only 1 ball of this yarn!), so I frogged enough to make it identical! Then frogged the rest into a ball later. The yarn was wavy, but not too bad and The socks look much better. All in all, it wasn’t too painful and was quite a useful experience (although one I hope I don’t repeat too often)!

Thank You sooo much for this awesome video. I just unraveled 3/4 of a long sleeve sweater knitted alpaca yarn. I will soak my yarn, and let it dry completely before knitting it in to something else. Thanks to the lady on facebook that posted your link as well.

Thank you so much! I reused yarn and knitted a scarf. For this project I was not toooo picky. I guess as a new knitter I had not thought I should have any concern using frogged yarn. Thank you for teaching me.

💛 Thanks for this vid - I’m just about to frog my first ever project, and these tips will be super helpful to reclaim the yarn 💛

Robyn Kirk here thank you for this experiment. The results were the opposite of my expectations,

@RoxanneRichardson

5 жыл бұрын

Interesting! What did you expect?

@robynkirk3144

5 жыл бұрын

@@RoxanneRichardson That the knitting itself would look terrible. I am truly amazed that I will now be able to reuse my large swatches in an emergency. Thank you so much. Robyn Kirk New Zealand.

Thank you for this! I was considering using yarn without processing it after frogging a sweater. After seeing this, I will soak all the yarn and take the time to prep it to reknit my sweater for best results.

Thank you so much....I learned a lot!

Thank you. I am reusing yarn and this helped. :)

Thank you! This is so helpful.

Excellent-thanks! I’m almost finished a baby blanket but ran out of yarn. I had done 3 tension swatches and wondered if reusing those would cause a texture problem. This answers my question beautifully and I feel confident to go ahead!

I like to joke about the fact that I spend more time unknitting than I do knitting! Unfortunately, it’s a true story. This tutorial was really helpful. I just frogged my first top down, circular yoke sweater in Scout by Kelbourne Woolens. I love the yarn but the problem I encountered was that there was a tremendous amount of fuzz all along the unravelled yarn so it has a different appearance than the virgin yarn when knit together in the same project.. I will be able to use the yarn in a smaller project where I use only the previously knitted yarn...I guess a hat and mittens are up next!

This is exactly what I was looking for. Just unraveled a swatch because I needed the yarn, and I was hoping, it would be fine to use it right away. Thank you! :)

@RoxanneRichardson

3 жыл бұрын

Glad I could help!

Excellent video

A very interesting experiment. I have not tried frogging and re-knitting acrylic by hand but when I was doing a great deal of machine knitting in acrylic I never had a problem re-knitting the frogged yarn without treating it in any way. Guess because the machine kept a constant tension. Some of the frogged knitting had been knitted up to a year before and fairly crinkerly but was rewound on a wool winder.

Thanks so much for doing this very interesting experiment and showing it so well! I’ve heard various things about how kinky yarn knits up. I’ve got a couple of UFOs that need starting over. Thanks to YOU, I have a good idea what to do! I like your rack over the pot method. My iron isn’t terribly reliable.

I do think other factors include the gauge of the knit, your personal tension when knitting, the moisture content of the environment (and thus the fibre) and also whether the yarn is Z/S ply. I'd liken it to the difference between cottons that are made for knitting/crochet, cottons for embroidery/sewing and then cottons made for lace making, tatting etc. It's more than the divide of mercerised cotton vs non-mercerised; it's to do with how tight the fibre is spun, how fine it is, how many/how it is mechanically plied, etc. I've done similar experiments with different tensions/gauges and the results are similar to yours, but without any time elapsing or blocking done 😉

Very helpful ..many thanks

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

This was extremely interesting! I wanna get into crochet and was wondering if I could practice then take it out and reuse it

Thank you for this experiment. Last year I discovered a packed UFO lost stitches because one of the bamboo straight needles broke. This project was my first attempt to knit a sweater so the gauge was loose in some places and very tight in other places. I decided to frog it and manually wound the yarn into a ball. I have not had trouble with the soft acrylic yarn being kinky so the gauge is consistently even because I switched to the Portuguese Knitting Method. I also decided to use a 40” circular so I could reknit both the back and front pieces at the same time. The ball is in a bowl and the next skein is in a clear plastic bag so it would be easier to prevent tangling the strands. It’s on a temporary hiatus so I can finish a family knitted gift.

@RoxanneRichardson

5 жыл бұрын

I have certainly knit with kinky yarn with no problem in the past (it is usually my default approach, because it takes the least amount of up-front time). In this experiment, I was letting the outcome worry me, which caused my tension to change. If you're not concerned, then you're more likely to be knitting in your normal, relaxed manner.

thank you so much, i learned alot.

Or do like I do. Frog the project, roll it into a ball and set it aside for weeks, months, or years. The yarn straightens outs.

Wooooow thank you!!

My grandmother used to knit socks with yarn she had ripped from old sweaters because the socks became more fluffy, and that stayed like that when they were washed

Thank you very much!

Dear Roxanne, after letting your video sink in for a few weeks, I finally got the mental energy to frog half a lace wrap that's been waiting in a pile of shame for almost a year (stupid and arrogant mistake, casting on for the second half when I was tired and stressed out and managed to miss an entire report of twelve stitches. Only noticed it when I was about to seam the two halves together, aargh.) I've cheerfully frogged smaller projects and reused the material before, but loosely spun, self-patterning 1-ply lace yarn? Double aargh. But anyway, gentle handling seems to be the way to go, and a laundry rack makes for a nice and lightweight winding station. Time will tell how it looks rewound and reknit, because I really want this wrap to be finished...

@elisabethkronqvist3987

4 жыл бұрын

Update on the lace wrap situation in case anyone's taking an interest: I finished the other half and grafted the two pieces together in the first days of June. It's been a few months now and the season for lightweight scarves in fall colours is approaching. Looking at it now, I'm not quite sure anymore which half was knit with frogged and soaked yarn.

Very interesting. I would enjoy a video about washing and blocking. Never done this with any of my knits. What are the benefits and does every kind of knitting need to be blocked or just flat ones?

In the process of frogging my handspun 2-ply and wondering how well it will hold up in the reclaiming CHORE! Some of it was knit holding 2 strands together. (omg you need an extra set of hands!) If there is a better way of ripping out work than winding the 2 strands into a ball first - I should have tried it! Decision made: I will skein/soak/dry the yarn and just see how it does! Perhaps throw it into some dye bath and accept it's future use is TO BE DETERMINED. :)

This made me think of sock blanks that are so popular with some dyers. Some people say just knit from the blank, but that might not be quite as nice?

@RoxanneRichardson

5 жыл бұрын

I've knit in the past from kinky yarn with no problem, other than taking a longer soak. Socks are usually machine washable, and more likely to come out fine after being knit from the kinky yarn. A lot of this is whether or not it bugs you to have the rough surface (and therefore start questioning yourself and your knitting). Steaming is a quick solution (relative to soaking the yarn or a long soak of the knitted item), and worth having as one of several options.

As always such an awesome lesson. You mentioned acrylic yarn. What are your thoughts on a bamboo or bamboo blend? Or a cotton or cotton blend with a small % of wool? As to their behavior. Thank you

So interesting. I have unfrogged sweaters of acrylic yarn and reknitted them and not even given a thought about it. I guess I would have if it was wool.

Hi Roxanne, I found your youtube very interesting. I have some unpicked/frogged yarn and unused yarn. Do you think it will be ok to knit them up together in the same garment? Or should I skein and wash the new yarn as well as the frogged yarn? I need to use them both to have enough to make a garment. Kind regards, Jacquie

I have to frog a baby blanket that is years old as I have lost the pattern. It's acrylic sport weight yarn. I think I'll soak it 24 hours, towel dry it, then lay it out before rewinding.

I’m trying the steam method with bamboo yarn….so far I have some success.

So , curious question .. would winding the yarn back up into a ball either without steaming or with steaming, change the yarn in a different way or actually stretch it out too much if steamed first ? I will have to experiment myself. Thank you for taking the time to do this !!! Learned alot :)

@RoxanneRichardson

5 жыл бұрын

Before winding it up, allow the steamed yarn to fully dry, and then wind it as you would wind any yarn: fairly loosely, rather than into a tight ball.

In speaking of synthetics, you used the phrase "killing the fiber." What does this mean?

I had crochet cardigan in the wardrobe for a year and I undo it and the wool is very flat cause I wanted to crochet another cardigan the first one was one I use fresh new wool so is so puffy and feeling thick, may be I hand wash it to it puff up again for the second cardigan.

Do you have a pattern for children's socks using Magic Loop? I would love to have one. Thanks!

@forvdr5231

5 жыл бұрын

Any in-the-round pattern for socks can be done with Magic Loop. Start with Ravelry, where there are over 50,000 sock patterns, and narrow it down to "children's."

I'm wondering if this would react differently with say, acrylic vs. wool yarns? I've reused acrylic yarns from previously knitted or crocheted items, but wondering if this would be different reusing woolen yarns. Thank you for your vid.

@RoxanneRichardson

2 жыл бұрын

I'd be inclined to soak in warm water rather than steaming it. You *can* steam it, but you'd need to be careful about not killing the acrylic.

@tinadotter7577

2 жыл бұрын

@@RoxanneRichardson Thank you for the tip Roxanne.

Have you ever written any books 📚? 🌺

Did she say what the yarn content was?

@RoxanneRichardson

5 жыл бұрын

In the last section of the video I stated that this yarn was 100%, and I discussed synthetic yarns.

@patriciavancurler7945

5 жыл бұрын

Roxanne Richardson thanks much. Great experiment, thanks

I found that soaking is safer for man-made fibres...in warm water.

What is the yarn?

@RoxanneRichardson

5 жыл бұрын

It's a 4-ply, worsted weight wool.