there has to be a list of hobbies one can try that cost practically nothing:

Solving Rubik cubes (a high quality speedcube is about 20$)

Crocheting/stitching (needles and yarn after cheap)

Writing (free)

programming

… (please expand if you have any ideas)

Crocheting/knitting is cheap to try out but once you really get into it (and start worrying about yarn quality and so on), the money pit opens.

Yep. Often when I wear a new jumper or whatever around people who know I knit, I get asked ‘oh, that’s pretty, did you make it?’

Lol no, that would have cost me like 5 times more. I couldn’t afford to make it myself.

is that just the value of your time or are you considering you’d use the fanciest yarn too?

It’s not considering the value of my time; a decent (actually wearable) yarn is far more expensive than most people think.

I would consider it a waste of my time to spend a couple hundred hours on a garment that’s barely wearable because it’s uncomfortable and borderline not washable. That’s what you will get with any yarn that won’t cost you over $50 in materials.

Cheap yarns are fine for beginner projects that aren’t made to be worn, but if you’re putting that much of your effort into a garment meant to be used, you should not be using bargain yarn. Your effort is worth too much to sabotage yourself that way.

TIL! I want to get my niece some pretty yarn (she’s just getting in to crochet) but i have no idea how to choose. I just go by “ooo pretty” and “ooo soft” and if it scores high on both, i get it for her. so far so good.