Nostepinne (also spelled nostepinde) is a Scandinavian word meaning “nest-stick”. It looks like a tapered dowel. Some have a notch or knob at the wider end. A nostepinne is a tool that is used to make center-pull balls of yarn by hand. You make a slipknot in one end of the yarn and loop it onto the notch or knob. Then, you can wind the yarn from the hank or skein around the nostepinne, until you’ve reached the end of the yarn. Once you’ve done that, you loosen the slipknot and slide the ball off the nostepinne. It gives you a nice ball that pulls from the center, so it doesn’t roll around the way a ball that pulls from the outside will.

This is one tool that I really, really want and still have not found. I have, currently, two hanks of alpaca yarn that I need to wind into balls before I can use. I also have… probably a dozen skeins of cotton thread that can only be pulled from the outside. It’s annoying, because the little skein bounces and rolls in my bag, the thread gets caught on things. I also have a huge cone of cotton yarn that, again, feeds from the outside. I’d love to be able to roll the cotton and the alpaca wool into nice, neat center-pull balls.

There are ways to make nostepinnes. I’ve seen people suggest using paper towel rolls or chair legs. However, I’d really like a proper nostepinne, since I think the paper towel roll ones would get banged around too much and the chair leg… I think it’d be too big. One option I might have is that I have small craft cones that I had to use for a Sunday School project a few years ago. I only have three left, not enough for my class. They’re the right size and shape and they’re made of sterner stuff than a paper towel roll would be. I may have to experiment with them to see if they would work.