YES. Unfortunately, most of it is. Anything that says “acrylic” or “polyester” or “nylon” is a plastic polymer, and it’s likely made from fossil fuels.
Yep, that includes the chenille blanket yarn you use for your amigurumi plushies.
And purchasing this kind of yarn brand new adds to our world’s plastic problem. It shows the suppliers that we want it, so they’ll keep making more.
Did you know that bits of plastic are being found in drinking water? Breast milk? Inside the human body?
While we’re not 100% sure that this is a truly bad thing yet (although, it certainly doesn’t sound good), some studies have come out recently that say it is probably bad. In a recent study, “people with microplastics in their arterial plaque were 4.5 times more likely to have a heart attack, stroke, or die in about 34 months after their surgery than those who did not have plastics in their plaque.”
Yikes! More research will show us in time if this is something we need to worry about, but my guess is that it doesn’t hurt to start taking this seriously.
And…there IS something you can do about it now, if you like to crochet and you use a lot of yarn.
You can buy your yarn secondhand.
Have you ever searched for “yarn” on Facebook marketplace? HOLY COW there is a bunch of it inside people’s houses. And it’s still in its original packaging, clean and untouched. A lot of it might end up in a landfill if the sellers don’t get any bites. And as all this plastic yarn decomposes in the landfill, some of the bits of plastic its made of can drain into the groundwater and contaminate EVERYTHING. Have you ever heard of landfill leachate? (No worries, I just Googled it myself)
All of this is just a terrible fate for this wonderful, perfectly useful yarn that may never find a forever home.
Unless you use it.
And a BIG plus to this is…you can get it cheap. I know all that yarn you’re buying from Joann is costing you a s*** ton.
I’m lucky enough to live near two secondhand craft stores that I LOVE, and they cut out a lot of this scavenging work for me. And yes, I score some precious blanket yarn there from time to time.
A lot of my crochet products that sell pretty well at markets use recycled cotton yarn, which is also more earth-friendly (NOT new cotton yarn; cotton requires a TON of water to grow!!). You can buy my pattern collection on my Etsy if you want to fast-track your crochet business to an eco-friendly place.
It’s worth rethinking your business model if you’re a crochet business owner. When you buy your materials new, you are contributing to this problem.
I know this is gonna sound harsh, but I think you owe it to the planet to thoughtfully and sustainably source your materials whether you’re a business-owner or a crafty gift-giver. Just think of all the babies drinking plastic from their mom’s boobs.