Needled

Today was very stressful for awhile.  I had gone into the backyard to water the vegetables which are doing really well.  At this point it is better too soak the plants to reduce water on the leaves causing mildew.  So instead of going in and out of the house I decided to sit under the apple trees and work on a new project, a basket.  Recently I wanted to take advantage of the millions of pine needles that fall into the yard every year.  So I found a video on www.youtube.com .  Once I understood how pine needle baskets were made I started weaving a basket to use in the yard too collect all those veggies!  The only supplies needed were pine needles, raffia, and a strong needle.  So I got out an 6 inch doll needle!  Doll needles are large, sharp and strong so that they can be found easily when making a doll.  Not something to step on!  So when I placed the hose to trickle water around the watermelons and went back to my basket the needle was gone!  I panicked!!  I've been trying to be extra careful with needles and now I had lost one of the most dangerous in some dry grass.  I flashed back to my doctor wanting to give me a tetanus shot.  The needle had to be found!  So I calmed myself and looked at the surface I had put it on and imagined were it would have fallen.  Then I had to take the weight of the needle into consideration.  That gave me two small areas to search.  So I knelt at the first spot and worked through the dead grass in layers and still couldn't find it.  The dead grass was so shiny that I was fooled several times into thinking that I had found the needle.  So I went into the house for a magnet.  I would have done so earlier but I had lost my large magnet and only had magnetic scissors.  The needle was so heavy it would never be picked up by the scissors but I hoped I would see it move.  The scissors didn't find anything but now I felt sure it wasn't in that area.  The second area was in the shade and the needle would have hit a board that was against the surface it was put on.  So the needle would have bounced a little.  So I narrowed the area and finally found the needle!  I was so relieved!  By then I had flooded the garden a bit!  But I was happy and so were the vegetables!  So much for the haystack!

Here is my pine needle basket so far.

Pine needle baskets are very easy to make.  So far my problem is not tightening the raffia enough while winding the pine needles.  The technique is just like my fabric basket but instead of fabric strips wrapped around soft cotton cording, the raffia is wrapped pine needles.  Here is a link to  by fabric basket tutorial  http://ravingsofamadcrafter.blogspot.com/2012/06/making-rug-from-sheets.html  This will never be as pretty as the fabric basket but it does give be a project to work on in the yard!