If you have wound your skein on your
niddy-noddy, be sure to tie it on several sides. After your skein is tied in at least 3 if not
4 places, slip the skein off the niddy-noddy.
Some niddy-noddies have a small peg holding the arm in place when it is removed the arm slides down an inch or so. I recommend tying the peg to the main post of the niddy-noddy to avoid losing the important little peg. Some nidddy-noddys will have one arm without a tip making that arm easier to slide off first.
Next, I twist the skein between my hands a few times and put the two loop ends together, let the yarn rotate a few times to make a soft twisted skein. Lastly, I loosely tie the two loop ends together, with different color yarn or string. The last tie keeps the twisted skein from pulling apart as it is being washed and then tangling. If I’m near a kitchen I use Dawn or other dish detergent for washing. If I’m at a hotel or guest house I will use a shampoo. If I’m down in my studio I will use Orvus. Usually all you need is just a drop of any of these and lukewarm water. Unless you spun in the grease, which means use the hottest water you have and enough detergent that the water feels slippery.
After rinsing and pressing out the water, your skein will probably be a lightly twisted, open circle, still tied but not tangled at all. I’m a firm believer in standing on my wrapped skein to press out the water.
Now
remove the last tie holding the loops together, put both hands/arms inside and
snap the skein back open. Drape
somewhere to dry before untying the 4 skein ties. Here the skein hangs on my loom lamp.
This
very old tool is referenced online at https://nzspinningwheels.wordpress.com/niddy-noddies-through-the-ages/, from Creative Fibre vol. 18 no. 4,
March 2016). In the article it mentions two women being
buried with textile tools, including niddy-noddies, in 834 CE in Norway. Think of your own spinning ancestors using
a tool much like the one in your hands today.
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