We are expecting more Organic Cotton Yarn in lace, sport, worsted & chunky weights as well as different textures. Also more Recycled Glass Beads in more sizes & colors.... plus much more. Please visit often for more details or you can register for our Newsletter & Eco-Friendly Product Updates.
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Ecobutterfly's mission is to provide knitters, crocheters, spinners, weavers and people who love hand knit items a very "Green" and high quality source for all kinds of certified organic cotton yarn that is mainly vegan and fair trade. We also provide knitting accessories that are either strictly organic or very eco~friendly. Customer service is a high priority and all orders are sent out the same or the next business day unless otherwise specified. We insist on using highest % post consumer recycled, 100% recyclable and/or biodegradable packaging/office supplies and a web site powered by the wind & sun so that we have a more positive impact on the planet beyond what we sell.
Welcome to Ecobutterfly
For many years now I have come to really understand the idea of organics. I went from buying organic produce when available to eating all organic 95% of the time. I recycle everyday. I reuse things and donate things I do not need anymore…….BUT when it came to my little knit shop I was still selling all conventional yarn. A big part of my business is professional alteration and repair of knitted and crocheted items which is a great way for my customers to recycle items that they would normally discard, but I wanted to take it further than that. As of a year ago or so I started to carry certified organic cotton yarn & fair trade yarn, including Pakucho yarn, Kusikuy yarn & Peruvian yarn. I knew that certified organic cotton would be the perfect choice for so many people including Vegan knitters. I personally worked with it and loved it. I was able to expose all types of knitters to something that they had never seen or heard about before. I saw that I was able to make a difference. This website was the inevitable next step. I want this website to be very user friendly and I think I have accomplished that. If you have any suggestions to improve this website please let us know.
Enjoy!
Ecobutterfly's goal is to be able to offer the finest certified color grown organic cotton yarn available on the market today. Pakucho fit that bill and then some. There are other companies like Lion Brand, Blue Sky Alpaca and Bernat that sell organic cotton yarn, BUT it is not always certified organic cotton yarn, definitely not fair trade and they use conventionally dyed colors. If you question any of these things always ask the company for the details. Based on these important points, Pakucho is the perfect choice (to read more on "fair trade" see the organic cotton yarns page). As far as Organic Wool is concerned, we question just how organic it is, especially when it is not certified. The U.S. government has certified organic standards in place when it comes to animals (what they eat, how they live, how they are treated and how they die). If one of these things is not strictly met, the wool that comes from these animals could be a problem and therefore not organic. This does not take into account the probable non~organic scouring process either. For example, if a sheep eats grass that has been exposed to toxic ground water, then that toxic residue ends up in the wool that is sheared to use in the making of yarn. Wool can be a very difficult thing when dealing with the term "organic". Certified organic is very important for that reason alone. You need to ask questions, especially when wool is marketed organic, but not certified. If an organic wool seller is not willing to tell you everything you want to know then run the opposite direction. For babies, wool is an irritating proposition anyway and the safe choice will always be in the purity of very soft certified organic cotton yarn. Even though organic cotton yarn is lacking in bright colors (unless it is dyed with conventional chemical methods), the wide range of earthy colors from Natural, Dark Chocolate to Deep Green and the soft veggie dyed colors available are well worth the trade-off to keep the general purity in tact. Making a baby blanket out of pure certified organic cotton yarn is a real show of love and it will be appreciated and treated as an heirloom, cherished by being handed down from one generation to the next. And, if by some extreme chance a baby that grows into a child refuses to let it go, even when it looks like it needs to be permanently retired, the planet will not mind its return to the earth.
Color Grown Organic Cotton Yarn: The Color Change
The two pictures above show the natural color change of the color grown organic cotton yarn. It darkens when washed in hot water and the machine dried. Heat is the key to deepen the colors. Also darker colors, like the Dark Green pictured above, darken more intensely than the lighter colors do. The natural, pictured above, is far more subtle when changing color. The great thing about color grown organic cotton yarn is that washing and drying it will not fade the color, unlike dyed yarn or fabric in general….. For more detailed care information about this wonderful yarn go to the care instruction page.
Dreaming of a “Green” Holiday Season!
With the holidays coming soon it is a good time to consider possibly making something about the holidays eco-friendly. This time of the year isn’t very “Green”, but it doesn’t have to be that way. It is almost impossible to make a lot of changes all at once unless you are really dedicated. There are some things that can be doable. Just take small steps toward better choices.
A lot of us grew up with the traditional Christmas Tree. I had a fake tree during my childhood. I didn’t have a real tree until I was a young adult. The smell of the pine and the feel of the needles were always far superior to plastic, and it was natural too. As my lifestyle began to change I thought about the fact that even though I love a tree for the holidays that it is not a very eco-friendly choice. It was really hard to give up what I was used to for so many years, BUT luckily I was able to consider a couple of other options.
I have a mini-metal sculpture that looks like a branchy tree and it holds candles. I put ornaments on it and it is really festive, BUT it does not have the same effect that a real tree has, though I still love it. Last year I found out that I could buy a potted tree. It was a great thing, but the tree can be on the smaller side, which was a fine trade-off. In order for this to work you would either have to bring the tree outside after the holidays ended and take care of it until the following year or go someplace and plant the tree where it can do some good. Both options take work, BUT it occurred to me that maybe someone could start a business that rented potted trees for the holiday season. Once you were done it could be given back and some good would come out of this traditional ritual of chopping down millions of trees each year..... trees that would best serve us by growing and helping to purify our air. I hope this concept is not too far off. It would be an excellent way for people to enjoy a real tree and do something good that would require no extra work compared to buying a standard tree (a tree that would end up in a trash can by January).
I dream about things like this all the time and I guess in time it will be reality. I hope so anyway. Until then I do the best that I can to make a difference here and there. I wanted so much to contribute to a “Green” holiday concept that I started to carry a line of earth friendly cards called
Grow-A-Note (Cards for holidays and special occasions that grow wildflowers when planted in the ground, unlike conventional cards that are generally not made from recycled paper and that mainly end up in a landfill). I also designed a Holiday Stocking (Available as a Hand Knit and a Knitter's Pattern) made out of the Pakucho Color Grown Organic Cotton Yarn (the yarn greatly inspired the design). My thoughts about what I could do to have a real tree for the holidays led me to think about these ideas and how they could be better choices compared to their conventional counterparts. I even searched high and low for an eco-friendly organic holiday stocking and found absolutely nothing.
I hope that this unique and beautiful idea for the stocking will inspire people to seek out and feel good about the “Green” choices available to them and that there are people like me trying to offer things that are not normally viewed as conventional, but can add to people’s lives and not take away anything at the same time. This is what I strive for with Ecobutterfly…… I really want and hope to make a difference.
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