What to Do with Your Straight Needles

I have a pretty big collection of straight metal knitting needles. I sometimes use them, but generally find that they can make my knitting a little uneven, so they have been hanging out upstairs, collecting dust. I put a couple of them to good use last week...making a jar terrarium!

There are a million tutorials out there and they all say the same thing, so I'm just adding to the plethora, but I wanted to share because, though I am a crafty lady, I seldom have time to do them and share.

It all started with this bottle. We bought some Martinelli's Apple Juice a while ago (so good!) mostly for the bottle. John asked me what I was going to do with the bottle, so I hit the interwebs and found a solution! The first thing I did was remove the label by soaking the bottle in soapy water for just a couple minutes.

I then assembled the necessary ingredients and set to work! You'll need some rocks/pebbles, activated charcoal, sphagnum moss, woodland moss (or any kind of living moss), potting soil or orchid mix (I have the later), a trowel, and small plants. I forgot to photograph the knitting needles, but you'll need those too. I used a US 8 and a US 13, but it doesn't matter as long as you have at least one biggish sized one. :)

First, a layer of rocks for drainage. The sound of the rocks hitting the bottom of the jar made me fear for the jar's safety, so I tipped the jar on its side and gently poured the rocks in with the trowel. I poked the rocks around with a knitting needle until they were pretty flat and I couldn't see the bottom of the jar through the layer.

Then, a layer of activated charcoal. It will filter the air, so it doesn't get stinky and moldy in there. I think I probably should have put it down over the next layer instead of under it. Will it matter? Probably not. I couldn't get it spread very evenly, but it should just cover the rock layer.

Next, a sphagnum moss layer, again leveled with a few pushes of the head-end of the knitting needle (as opposed to the pointed end). You could do a layer of the orchid mix (a bark mixture) here instead if you have potting soil for the top layer. They both wick moisture and hold it, keeping the jar humid. John repotted his birthday ficus and used all the potting soil for that, so I only had the orchid mix for the top layer.

Here is the fun part, which I, regrettably, tackled so excitedly that I forgot to photograph it! :P In any case, I took the first plant from it's little plastic pot and removed enough soil from the bottom and sides of the root ball that it would sit low in the jar (not a lot of headroom in mine, but yours might be taller) and be narrow enough to fit through the mouth. If there are any dead leaves on the plant, pluck those off before you put it in the jar. They could get moldy. Once in, I positioned the plant where I wanted it by nudging it around with the knitting needle. Then, I used the trowel to pour in the soil I removed from the root ball and pushed it around the roots and tamped it down with...you guessed it: the knitting needle! A larger sized knitting needle is helpful here because they tend to have a larger flat end, which tamps soil much easier than a smaller one.

I ended up having enough soil from the plants themselves that I didn't need to use the orchid mix at all, but you could use it instead of soil, as I had initially planned.

The final step is the woodland moss! Pour it in and move it around with the knitting needle. You can decently aim where you want things to land by tipping the jar and pouring with the trowel. The knitting needle is good for shaking things off the plants, too. I found a smaller needle works slightly better for that purpose. :)

This gets the sides dirty, though, so clean the inside when you are done pouring dirt and moss in. I speared a paper towel onto the smaller knitting needle and swished it along the worst spots. I would advise taping the paper towel into a ball on the end after you spear it so it doesn't slide up and down. That wasn't very helpful.

Add a drop or two of water (the soil and plants are likely moist enough to sustain the jar), add a couple of decorative elements, and you've got a cute little landscape in a pretty jar! I only added a pile of rocks, but I found an Etsy shop full of handmade terrarium decorations. She actually sells terrariums made with the single-serving bottles of this same apple juice, if you don't want to go to the trouble of making one yourself!

TIPS: You might want to start with a jar that has an opening big enough for your fingers like a mason jar or lidded glass vase. This was manageable, but might be too fiddly for some, especially if you want to put tiny decorations in just the right spot. Keep it out of direct sunlight so you don't cook the plants. Use tropical plants in bottles or jars with narrow necks and keep the lid on so they will create and live on their own humidity. If you get any signs of mold (it is normal in small quantities), take the lid off and let it dry out a bit. It needs very little added moisture to survive. You can make a terrarium with cacti and succulents, but they need an open, ventilated container to keep dry. Take the container with you when you buy plants. My nursery had a terrarium plant section. We just had to hold the plant up to the jar to see if it was too tall for the jug or test the leaves to see if they would bunch up enough to get through the neck. Go for variety in genus, height, color, and texture to make it really dynamic. Don't think too hard about it. Dirt and plants don't demand perfection. :)

My favorite part of this project was that I only had to buy the plants and the woodland moss! I have a couple orchids, so I have sphagnum moss and orchid mix for them. The stones are from last year's failed flower potting event and John uses the charcoal in his fish filters (go to a pet store or landscaper for small quantities of it!). If you are a gardener or plant-owner, you doubtless are equally or better equipped than I to do this on the cheap.

Sorry for the super long and photo-laden post! If you try one yourself, I want to see it, so let me know!

The Secrets of Seaming

Anyone who knows me know that I love to seam. It's relaxing and you have a new garment when you are done! What's not to love? Well, most people are afraid. Someone at the shop just the other day told me she was terrified she was going to ruin her first sweater by seaming it poorly, so she waited ages to do it. Then she realized as she was doing it, she could take out any mistakes and fix them. Most people just don't know how to do it or where to start. Let me show you.

Most tutorials use contrasting yarn to aid in the visual representation. I always find that somewhat annoying because then I don't know what to expect when I use the same yarn as the garment was knit in, so I'm going to show you with the same yarn and hope that I don't confuse you horribly. You can click on the photos for larger images.

Step One: Block your pieces.

This is critical. The edges lie down, the stitches open up, and all your edges are blocked to matching lengths. Those schematics in your patterns are really important.

Step Two: Sew the shoulder seams.

There is a prescribed order for sewing your sweater together. It's all about the sleeves. Begin by laying your front and back pieces flat, right side up, with the shoulders lined up. If you are a wise knitter (and I'll admit that I seldom am), you will have left a long enough tail when binding off that you can use it to seam your shoulders together. A length of the shoulder seam plus one half of that length ought to do the trick.

Run the yarn through each corner on the arm-hole edge of the pieces (you'll see I had to use a different piece of yarn because my tail wasn't long enough). You will work on each piece in this same order (I did front, then back here, but back, then front works just as easily).

The next step is true of garter and stockinette pieces: find the "v" of the nearest knit stitch in the piece you threaded first (here the front) and run your needle behind that "v". Pull the yarn through.

Do the same for the other piece. Here the back is upside-down, but the "v" I have picked up is in the same direction as the one I picked up on the front. This is will put you a half-stitch off, but it will look nicer and won't make the slightest difference in the long-run. If you are doing a stockinette stitch garment, choose "v"s that are one stitch away from the bound-off edge or you'll get an annoying bump right where you are seaming. Garter stitch does this automatically because the knit stitches are each a purl bump away from the bind-off row, if that makes sense.

Continue picking up every "v" on each side until you get to the end.

Weave in the ends. Since you get this lovely seam on the inside, I like to weave my ends back and forth through it like this for several stitches.

There you have a lovely shoulder seam!

Step Three: Set in sleeves.

Sleeves are hard enough to explain as it is and this sweater's sleeves are oddly shaped, so I won't go into detail yet, but I will tell you that as soon as the shoulders are seamed, clip or pin the sleeve into the armhole and seam it flat this way, taking each clip out as you get to it. This assures that the sleeve remains perfectly fitted to the armhole. I'll try to show you some tricks when I get to seaming my Exeter's sleeves, but it's largely an improvisational seaming experience.

Step Four: Sew the sides and sleeve seams.

These are my favorite seams! You need a length of yarn 3-4 inches longer than the seam you want (or longer if you wish to be more cautious). You can seam all the way from the bottom edge of the sweater out to the cuff of your sleeve if you want or have each seam meet under the arm. It's up to you and it works either way.

Match the sides (you'll see I was naughty and forgot to do my shoulder seams and sleeves first, oops! Trust me, it only makes things harder for you!). You can clip them like the sleeves if you want.

Run the yarn through the lower corner of each piece. You will alternate between the pieces in the same order that you run the needle through, just as for the shoulder seams.

When doing an invisible seam in garter, catch the garter bumps, not the knit stitches. I don't think it matters terribly which ones you catch as long as you are consistent and you skip the edge stitch. Edge stitches are ugly and should always be ignored. A purl ridge consists of bumps that go over and bumps that go under. I have gone through one that goes over because the yarn I am drawing through will look like a bump that goes under (a later photo will illustrate this better).

(I can't get these next two photos to upload turned the right direction, so sorry about that. I'll try to fix it!)

Choose the same stitch on the opposite side and go through it the same way. One stitch in and an "over" bump.

Continue in this manner for an inch or so. Here you can see the zig zag of my yarn and (hopefully) how it goes into each purl bump better than I explained it earlier.

Tug the ends of your seaming yarn (not too tightly, though!). Ta-da! It's invisible! Cool, eh? I always get a seam-y indent, so it's never really invisible, but I've had some pretty darn close ones before. The second photo is what the wrong side looks like. Very tidy.

Now to invisible seam stockinette: insert your needle into the middle of the second "v" from the edge (remember those edge stitches are silly and to be ignored). With a little wiggle or some fishing you should be able to find and catch a bar in there. Here it is fished out:

Do the same on the other piece. I was seaming a fingering weight sweater, so instead of catching the bar of every stitch, I skipped one. I find this gives a little better drape with just as much support and it's both less tedious and easier to fudge (because you don't always have an equal number of rows on each piece and some times you have to skip an extra one here and there to get it to match up perfectly). Here's how it shapes up: (again, sorry about the orientation)

Invisibly!

I hope this is at least somewhat enlightening. As long as it isn't entirely confusing, I'll be happy. I'm also happy to answer any questions! Either here or on Ravelry. Wednesday I have lots of exciting progress and projects, so I'll see you then (with a more timely post)!