Curly Yarn Doll Hair Fail

Recently I've started getting into making felt dolls. I love them, but I wanted to try something different and use yarn hair instead of felt hair.

Of course, I couldn't be easy and want straight hair though, NOOOO i wanted curly hair. So I went searching online and found this tutorial on making curly yarn doll hair. I love how hers turned out. Its so cute and bouncy. So i put it to the test.

Since I was just testing this, I went to walmart to pick up some cheap yarn and I found a bunch of fun colors. I also picked up some 12 in dowel rods. They came in packs, so I got one pack for each size since I didnt know how this was going to turn out.

I wrapped the yarn around the dowel rods, ending it in a slipknot so it wouldn't come off.

I used up all the dowels I had and wrapped a whole bunch of colors, cause I was dead certain that this was going to work perfectly. My sink was in use, since I hadn't done the dishes yet. So, instead I put them in a large baking dish and filled it with water to let them soak over night. I had to put a plate overtop so they would't float to the surface.

After they had their soak, I took them out, layed them out on a baking sheet and baked them at 200 degrees. In the tutorial I was following, she had baked them for less than an hr. I had to bake my for over 2 hours to get them to dry, checking on them every 15 min or so. Even then, I let them sit over night to dry completely.

 I was so excited to finally pull the yarn off the dowel rods (and I admit this part was rather fun), but to my dismay, they did not turn out correctly at all :(. They barely have any curl, its not bouncy, and its all weird and floppy. Where did I go wrong? I have no idea. In the tutorial, she said she was using acrylic yarn, but I have a feeling it wasnt 100% acrylic and I need to find some mohair yarn. So sad, I really liked my colors. But thats how you learn, So I will just try it again and I will be back with hopefully better results :).