Do You Really Need to Straighten Frogged Yarn?
I had a nice conversation with fellow frogger Jean in Washington state. She frogs thrift store sweaters too. She uses some of the yarn for herself and gives a lot away to charitable organizations like her mother’s church group for knitting into prayer shawls. She gets a very good deal at her local St. Vincent De Paul and Value Village second hand stores for $.99 or $.50. I don’t get quite as good a deal as that, the best I do is $1 to $2.49. Of course I’m in Massachusetts where everything is more expensive.
We both marveled at how a lot of people never learn how to frog yarn, or are intimidated by the process. But when you know how to do it right, it’s not so hard. It’s about picking the right kind of sweater and knowing the short cuts.
Swift Frogging Method
Jean’s first sweater took her more that six hours, with pulling and winding by hand. Now she has a ball winder (which we both agree is an absolute must) and foot-pedaled yarn swift that she built herself. She says it’s sort of a cross between a yarn swift and a spinning wheel. The swift does the pulling part of the frogging and takes up the loose yarn. It even has a counter to keep track of the number of times it goes around and that lets her calculate the length of the yarn. This way, she can completely take a sweater apart, have it measured and balled in about 2 hours.
Ball Winder Frogging Method
Her method is very efficient. I do things a little differently. I use the ball winder to frog the sweater, winding up as much as I can fit in each ball. I then take a 10-yard sample by wrapping 20 times around an 18″ ruler. I weigh the sample with a micro scale and then do the math on the full weight of all skeins. Then I know how many yards by weight. Mine is probably less perfect, but it works for me. Takes me about one to two hours, depending on how stubborn the sweater is.
When a sweater gives me too much resistance to use the ball winder, I just wind it up by hand into a ginormous ball. I then take my sample for weight, determine the yardage and begin winding into skeins. It only takes a little longer. To keep the ball from rolling everywhere, I keep it in a tall planter (clean of course) while I wind it.
Wash and Frog or Frog and Wash?
Then we got onto the subject of washing. Should you wash before or after frogging? There are differing opinions and I encourage you all to make up your own minds. You can either wash the sweater first and then frog it, or you can frog it and then wash the yarn. Method number one is ever so much easier. I only use method number two when it is ordered special because it is so much work.
For Jean, most of the kinks fall out of the yarn once it’s balled. For me, it depends on the yarn. Merino tends to keep the curl most, but cotton falls out more easily. Either way, you can still knit with unstraightened yarn. The kinks will fall out the first time you wash the completed project. Some people are more picky, though, and want to see what it will look like as a finished project while they are knitting.
If I know I’m going to be unraveling a sweater, it just doesn’t make sense to wash after. Washing before is quicker. I use a wool detergent for the gentler yarns and the wool, but regular detergent is fine for cotton. I have also talked to several recycled yarn retailers and they all tell me the same thing. Wash it first! What are you a masochist?
Concerns with Straightening Wool
I do sometimes like to wash and straighten the yarn I use for myself after unraveling. Merino is so beautiful and I get that luxury experience from starting with straight yarn that looks brand new. The biggest concern I have about washing and straightening, though, is with tension. If you put too much tension on the yarn while it’s wet, it will be stretched out when you wind it. It will then want to stretch back to its original tension. The next knitter may end up with variations in tension in the finished project. When you wash first, you maintain he same tension in the yarn, avoiding this risk. Believe me, I learned this the hard way the first time I straightened wool.
Best Frogging Tutorial
Jean then proceeded showed me a frogging tutorial that put my thoughts of making one for this site to shame. Why try to improve on perfection? This tutorial suggests washing and straightening as well, but again, the author admits that it’s a matter of personal preference. There is also an excellent link included in the tutorial that lets you estimate how much yarn you will get from a given sweater. So smart!!!!
If you don’t have the time to frog, then of course, buying recycled yarn makes the most sense. But if you have some time on your hands, read the tutorial carefully, then go out and get your first sweater to frog. You might be surprised at how therapeutic ripping a sweater can be. To me, it’s one of those rare releases of destruction. One time, the mother of a friend of mine had to smash a window with a shovel to get into her house when she forgot her keys. She later said how good it felt to smash that glass. Frogging is like that for me. Sometimes, a little destruction feels good. And look what you get out of it!
