Houston, We Have A Problem
On Wednesday, I went to pick up Caleb from school, got in line with the other Moms, turned off the car and pulled out my knitting. I set the Devon sock in my lap and reached into my sock bag for the row counter. At that point, my working needle (the only one of the 5 not holding stitches and therefore attached to the sock) slid gracefully off my lap, down between my seat and the center console and lodged itself in the space between the track for adjusting the seat forward and back and the floor of the car. This entire space is about 1/8 inch deep - perfect for a cozy nest for a DPN. I know it's there, I've seen it a couple of times when I poked a piece of paper down there, but I have no way of grabbing it. I can't get to it from under the seat because there's no working room to get my fingers in there. Unless it dislodges at some point in the future (it's possible that a couple of hard right turns will get it loose), I've lost my needle.
I hope you all have a wonderful weekend, I'm going to go order another set of DPN's.
posted by Melanie at 6:55 AM
15 Comments:
How about chewing gum or poster putty on the end of a straw? I've found that often works to retrieve small things from small spaces...
Of course, it's more fun to buy a new set of needles. :-)
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Ugh. Been there. Mine got stuck in the console. Hubby actually disassembled it partway to get the needle out.
I'll agree with the "sticky substance on a stick" suggestions already made.
I work in a hospital, and my husband used to as well. We have tons of cool toys, designed to take things out of people's bodies, that we can instead use to grab that pesky DPN out of the tiny space it fell into. I would loan you some, but your new DPNs will probably arrive before my forceps will.
However, this is also why I have several sets of every size of DPN. I bought lots of dpns from people who were destashing on eBay. I pick up stray sets from people who want to get rid of them. I don't care if they look the same, as long as they fit into the same hole on my needle gauge.
Can the seat be removed to save the dpn?
This has happened to me. Use the flat end of a bamboo skewer or chopstick to push the needle out where you can grab it. In my car I move the seat all the way forward and, from the back seat, push the needle as far forward as I can get it. Then I move the seat all the way back and pick up the needle. PITA, but it's faster than ordering new needles.
If it's a metal dpn you can use a magnet ... Can't give you much more as I always use circulars. Avoiding the problem of loosing needles (I once lost one on the couch ... took me weeks, then I took a nap, took a pillow and there was something poking in my head. Found the dpn ...)
Poking with a long skinny thing (skewer, knitting needle), and sticky on a stick are good ideas. Mechanics have a couple of tools for retrieving small items from small spaces: magnet on a flexible stick and retracting fingers also on a flexible stick. Maybe your husband or car mechanic can help.
Anyway, if you poke with a skewer/needle, poke at the point as pushing it down should make the other end go up so you can get a grip on it.
You can prevent a reoccurance by clamping your needles and sock stitches in a clamshell-style eyeglass case. It'll prevent needle breakage, too.
Life is full of little challenges. My leaking quarter-century-old water heater is getting replaced today. Talk about sticker shock!
I feel your pain! I've dropped all kinds of things in that tiny little space, but losing a DPN is among the most painful losses...
Is it a metal or a wood DPN? If it's metal maybe a magnet of some sort? If it's wood, I agree with the sticky suggestions.
Oh, that's super unfortunate. I once lost my DPN during the take-off of a four hour plane ride. That was not very enjoyable.
Tweezers? I had some really long ones from Restoration Hardware (a few years ago now)
That is too bad. I know how that feels. I recently pulled out a sock from my knitting bag to find one of my size 0 Darn Pretty dpn broken into two pieces. Urgh!
I dropped a size 0 dpn into the heat vent on the car dashboard. The needle dropped into the heater, stopped the fan, and burned out the motor.
My husband wouldn't have found out, but the mechanic had to show him the weird "stick" that caused all the damaage.
Sounds familiar but fortunately, I was able to get the dpn out with another dpn. I still have little stitch markers stuck somewhere in the car.
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