Y is for Yo-yo...yes it is!

Yea you know it baby! So cool that they named it twice!

Now I guess I should first explain to you what a Yo-yo actually is for those of you who have never known the wonder of the yo-yo (but really where have you been if this is the case). During my school days the yo-yo phase came round twice it was so ridiculously cool!

Basically a yo-yo is an object consisting of an axle connected to two discs with a length of string looped around the axle – they come in all shapes, colours and sizes but they are always amazing – and usually they fit in the palm of your hand so maybe they don’t come in all sizes and really they are mostly round so they don’t come in many shapes either....hmm.

HOW TO PLAY WITH IT:

To play with a yo-yo you loop the end of the string round your finger and wind the yo-yo up then in a floppy hand gesture of a way you let the yo-yo flop out of your hand and gravity unwinds it sending the axle and 2 discs into a spin. The yo-yo spins out of your hand down the string and at the bottom spins back up winding itself back up into your hand. This is known, originally, as yo-yoing or for the young ‘gangsta’s’ among you ‘flinging’.

ADVANCED PLAY:

Once you have mastered ‘flinging’ – no I’m not cool enough to say that yet – once you have mastered basic yo-yoing you can move on to more exciting tricks. A kin to a BMX bike jumping over mounds of mud, a synchronised swimmer or even an Olympic skier you too can make yo-yoing look that good.

Enter sleeping – this is where you make the yo-yo spin at the bottom of your string for a time instead of it winding right back up into your hand. For me I used to flick it hard and fast out of my hand and it nearly always worked – though it did flick back up into my hand quite hard so be careful.

Once sleeping is mastered you can try ‘walk-the-dog’ – get your yo-yo to sleep and then run it along the ground before it winds back up – it looks like you’re walking a dog...except the dog is a yo-yo that pings back up to you....good stuff.  

‘Around the World’ – basically a trick where you throw the yo-yo out and then into the air and loop it around you like a UFO orbiting the earth - its super awesome! 

 

So do you know any other tricks? Let me know? I'm thinking of taking up the yo-yo again...phase 3 of yo-yo Hannah is coming! Also...

THE CHAMPIONSHIPS:

For those of you brave enough to take this further you can even enter competitions like the European Championship or the International Yo-yo Open in New York. All you need to do is master the compulsory tricks and prepare a freestyle section and you too could be a Yo-yo master.

Ok Y is done....hope it was ok! Tomorrow I'll try and be funny...xxxx