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Spinning yarn: oh god, don't let me mess it up

Spinning yarn
I’ve been kind of/sort of experimenting with yarn spinning since Louise from Spin City hypnotized me at a craft show about a year ago. I bought two drop spindles and some bats of fibre. The addiction began.
I did an informal spinning class with some friends from work: one of us who knew what she was doing, and the rest of us who just wanted to squish fibre and look at sparkly bats. I was intimidated: I spun up 50g of highly uneven green fibre, and it sat in my spinning stash for a long time.
Louise invited me to join her spinning group on Facebook: it’s full of amazing spinners sharing gorgeous handspun yarns, and everyone is so supportive and helpful that I find myself scrolling through posts when I need a break from the bad news in life.
Louise had the idea to have monthly themes, kind of like a spin-a-long. This past month was Bollywood! I love the fabrics, the shine, the amazing choreographed group dances. I love the music: I studied it throughout my “world music” class in university (for the record I think that name is stupid because it classifies everything outside of western music norms as an “other.”)
I remembered that I had a braid of red and burgundy fibre hiding in my spinning stash. I got the idea to ply it with some gold thread to evoke the shine of Bollywood textiles.

Spinning yarn
Plus, I got to use my new cheaply made niddy noddy to wind it off the spindle! Still, throughout the whole process, my mind was like this:
“Wow this is actually really cathartic, why don’t I do this more often?”

“OH GOD I THINK I OVERSPUN THE FIBRE MY DRAFTING IS TERRIBLE IT’S NOT EVEN OH MAN I THINK I’M RUINING THIS GORGEOUS FIBRE WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING?!”

Oh yeah, that’s why I haven’t done this more often. Still, the gold thread…sort of plied? It’s not nearly as neat or nice as I was hoping, but  for a first “finished” attempt, I’ll take it. I bought a gorgeous bluegreen bat from Louise at the Waltham Abbey Wool show a couple weeks ago, and there was a deal on sparkly thread so I also bought silver and blue.

A photo posted by Angie Panozzo (@gamercrafting) on Jan 16, 2017 at 11:38am PST

I think I just might do some more spinning in the near future. It’s an excellent distraction from a world that seems intent on imploding on itself!
If you want to try spinning, join Louise’s group for some sage advice and check out her shop for some unbelievably gorgeous batts, spindles, braids, and handspun yarns.
Spinning yarn

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Make a niddy noddy for cheap

Make a niddy noddy for cheap: GamerCrafting.com

Okay, so most of you know that I hand dye yarns and I also recently started spinning yarn with a drop spindle. I’ve been making do with a yarn swift for winding yarn into skeins, but ohhhh man is that annoying. Don’t even get me started on how enraged I get when my yarns tangle in the ends of the swift arms! New year’s resolution: get a nice wooden swift and ditch the metal swift of doom that I currently own.
So, I needed a niddy noddy: a simple tool for winding yarn into skeins that apparently and inexplicably costs an arm, a leg, and most of my left hand to get from Ashford. If you live in the US there are several Etsy sellers that make them with PVC pipe: but if you live over here in Europe the shipping charges will eat you alive.
And then I found this post over on Simply Notable.
“Hmm,” I thought: “I could probably do that.”
I wrote down all of my measurements and headed to the nearest hardware store. They didn’t have the sizes recommended, so I improvised based on what I could find. I wanted to make a full size niddy noddy for normal skeins, and a smaller one for sample skeins and 25g skeins.

Make a niddy noddy for cheap

 

Large size

2 copper “tees”, 15mm (mine came in packs of two, you can find them in the plumbing section)
One large 15mm dowel, cut into one 11″ piece and four 5″ pieces
Adhesive

Small size

2 more copper “tees”, 15mm
Another 15mm dowel, cut into one 6″ piece and four 3″ pieces
Adhesive
At most home improvement stores, they will cut the wood for you at no charge. I availed myself of that benefit while I squealed over glittery wood finish (I regret not buying that).

Niddy Noddy avengers, Assemble!

Make a niddy noddy for cheap: GamerCrafting.com

This is the basic setup for both niddy noddies. Long piece in the middle, short pieces fit into either side of the copper tee. HOWEVER: one arm of the noddy will be facing up towards you. Like this.

Make a niddy noddy for cheap: GamerCrafting.com
I used Gorilla Glue to glue my pieces together for both noddies. Gorilla Glue needs a little bit of moisture and several hours to set. After setting, mine are perfect!

Cost

Cost for an Ashford  standard sized niddy noddy: £20
Cost for an Ashford sampler sized niddy noddy: £18.90
Cost for materials to make both yourself: about £12 if you don’t already have adhesive, and about £6 if you do. Sandpaper is also useful, but also very cheap. Making only one size will cost you £3-£4.
I’d say that’s a solid win, wouldn’t you? I’m off to wind some yarn!
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