Nota Noddy*

*The title will make sense (mostly) by the end of this post.

Here's my spinning post. :)

Here are some links I found useful:

• Crochetville Spinning Forum


• Spinning With a Top Whorl Drop Spindle (although mine's a bottom whorl)


• The Joy of Handspinning


• Plying a Balanced Yarn... I think I need to check out the rest of the tutorials!


• Spindle Spinning Instructions


• Ewe Devil's tutorials

The second link listed is the one I used for instruction while spinning my singles.

I think I've already described how I spun my singles.

To ply, I was initially going to use the instructions as given by that second link, but I didn't really have enough singles to make two balls. I tried wrapping them in two sections on my spindle handle, and letting the overtwist do the spinning. That didn't work so hot either... the yarn had been on the spindle long enough for the twist to "set" somewhat, and it also didn't keep the tension right for the two plies.

I tried to think about whether it mattered what direction the yarn was pointing... to visualize, I used proteins, where one end is the N terminus, the other is the C terminus. I then visualized alpha helices, and what happens when you look at them from different directions. My bizarre visualizations weren't sufficient, so I took my "tube" of blue roving, and drew a spiral on the paper wrapper. I then looked at it one way, lined up my hand with the "twist", and then reversed the direction. Same twist. Okay, N vs C terminus doesn't matter. (Hey... I may be crazy, but this terminology helps me.) So I used the "table-leg" method of plying. I took one of my singles, grasped one end in one hand, passed the spindle around a table leg, and then held the spindle loosely with the other hand. I then backed up until I was holding both ends of the single in my hand. I then attached these ends to my spindle, and proceeded to spin in the opposite direction than what I had done for the singles, working my way towards the table. (Obviously, I'm going to need to modify my methods somewhat for longer singles, but this did the trick.) Once I reached the table leg, I unhooked the yarn, and spun up to the end. I used the "plying a balanced yarn" link to determine how much spin to add.

At this point, I had both some singles and some doubles wound on my spindle. (I hadn't bothered removing the singles before plying the other bit.)

Finally, I need to set the twist. This is apparently done by winding the yarn on a niddy noddy, getting the yarn wet, and then letting it dry. (Think of having a shower right before bed, and then going to sleep when it's wet. Your hair will set in whatever way the pillow presses it, producing spectacular bed head. In this case, we're setting the twist.)

Aside: I was going to post a link here for reference, but now I can't find one that agrees with this... maybe I'm halucinating. However, it's too late to change what I've done.

I do not have a niddy noddy. After thinking about it for several days, I realised I have something else... what I have is not-a-niddy noddy... which from now on I'll call a nota noddy. Here's a photo of my nota noddy with my yarn wrapped around it:

My nota noddy is manufactured by Yaffa, and I bought it, if I remember correctly, as a four-pack at my local campus bookstore, where they came in an approximation of Carolina blue (known as "baby blue" outside of NC), and a frosty white. I took my wrapped yarn in the shower with me today (along with my Koigu socks, of course), and I'm now using the convenient hanging feature that came with the special nota noddy to drip dry my yarn. I'll have to unwind the yarn to get the hank off, but how much can you really expect from a nota noddy?

Well, I can't remember what else I wanted to say in this post, so I think I'll go noddy off and bake my pita bread. (No visitors again today... I think the ritual night-before-visit clearing of the coffee table must be scaring them off.)