Pencil Holders - Knitter's Version

I like my stuff to state - loud and clear - that I am a knitter. That's why I sometimes decorate items in my home with pieces of my knitting. This was also the case with these pencil holders. In true recycling fashion I used old tin cans as basis - I painted them, knitted a few small pieces using old yarn leftovers to fit them and glued the knitting to the cans. The first ones were knitted in random lace style which creates an organic look.
I really love how they turned out. The finished pieces look very stylish on your desk ... and of course they can be used to hold some of your knitting equipment as well :)

This work by Knitting and so on is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.



Materials

• old tin cans or old glass jars
• acryllic paint
• yarn (leftovers?)
• knitting needles appropriate for the yarn
• craft glue

Techniques ...
... if you like the random lace look of the purple containers

• Random Lace: a tutorial on how to knit these random lace pieces can be found in this blogpost about an ebook sleeve. 
• Provisional CO: My favorite method for a provision CO is the crochet provisional CO - it is shown in this Youtube video by New Stitch a Day.
• Grafting lace: Joni Coniglio has written several brilliant post on grafting in general and also on grafting lace - this one and this one.
  I guess this project is perfect to try the stitches (or formulas) because it doesn't really matter if you get one of them wrong - as long as you keep your number of stitches (it is RANDOM lace, after all).

Alternatively, you can just knit your piece with your preferred CO and BO and in any stitch pattern you like (e.g. plain garter stitch) and sew the edges together.

How-To

• Clean containers and remove labels (this blogpost by The Creek Line House explains how to do this without residue).
• Paint them with acryllic paint in your favorite color - I painted two coats on the outside and one on the inside.
• Measure your containers (height and circumference) and knit a piece that fits these measurements. I did plain garter stitch stripes (the tins painted white) and a few random lace pieces (the tins painted purple). I have written a tutorial on how to knit random lace a few years ago - you can find it here.
• If you've knitted a lace piece (random or otherwise), be sure to block it to size. It will look much nicer than before. I you've knitted a different stitch pattern, you may skip the blocking part - I did not block the garter stitch pieces.
• If you haven't grafted your piece, sew ends together to form a tube, pull it over your container and glue the knitted piece to your container. Let the glue dry and you're done.