We’ve had an email from Jill with a question that I’m hoping our wonderful legion of crafters will be able to answer:

I’ve recently unravelled a jumper I knitted many years ago. The wool is good quality and now ready to use again. I can’t get the crimp out of the man made fibre yarn. It’s also good quality and I’d really like to use it again. I’ve washed it and hung it out to dry but the crimp is still there. Have you any suggestions?

I’ve not unravelled that many things (due to a lack of materials not a lack of desire, frogging really appeals to my OCD) so haven’t had that much experience with resistant crimping – one jumper was sorted after a wash and dry cycle; the gentle tension of winding it into a ball was enough for another (a cotton one).

So any experienced yarn reclaimers got any advice?

(CCA photo by StefwithanF)

I always thought wooden transport pallets were one of those things that were reused ad infinitum – or at least until they fall apart – because of those “pallets wanted” signs around industrial-type estates near motorway or, say, the docks in Liverpool (somewhere we frequent more than most people because ooh! cool industrial stuff!). But lately, I’ve started to see them dumped around various places, suggesting it’s not worth people’s bother to take them to one of those “wanted” place.

(Tsk, people, eh? The worst is the dozen or so I saw dumped down the road from us last night – one road down from a household waste site. I guess they either didn’t want to wait for it to open, didn’t want to have to pay to leave them there or didn’t want to find somewhere to take them for reuse even though they clearly had a truck to get them there in the first place. Grr.)

Anyway, reusing them. John’s dad reclaimed the wood from a couple of old pallets to make a fence for his brother’s garden. I’ve also heard about cleaner, nicer ones being spruced up a bit (sanded to remove the roughest bits and varnished) to make a futon base.

Any other suggestions?

(Photo by Gastonmag)