Momma Always Licked Her Thread. Licked it Good, Too.

So, I've told you before that I grew up with a crafting mom. She always had the largest room in the house dedicated to her mounding collections of fabric, thread, metal bits & bobs, beads, bobbins, second hand and vintage toys. Oh, gosh. You name it, she had it and she was going to repurpose it into something amazing, inventive and totally desirable. 

She had this thing she did though. Before she'd thread a needle, she'd stick the end of the thread in her mouth and pull it out. It sort of glued the stray fibers together so that she could thread the needle quicker. She never used a needle threader that I can remember, likely because she had long become fed up with losing it in the couch cushions and besides, her mouth was always handy! By the end of the day, she would have hand sewn so many elf faces or angel wings that she'd have a wad of thread bits in her mouth that had accumulated from each time she'd threaded the needle. She'd be chewing on like it was gum! 

So, that brings me to ask you jewelry making, bead weaving artists: Do you lick the end of your thread before you thread it through the needle?