Any Suggestions?

Okay, I have never been good at pre-washing my fabrics. Perhaps it was because of my extreme dislike of the iron. . . I don't really know. But I have begun to try to pre-wash my fabrics-- and this is what I got!A nice little nest of strings. And this was AFTER I managed to free all the fabric from this tangled mess. So, any ideas what the trick is? How do I avoid having a huge tangled mess