You know about stretching so it sounds like you know that your plant isn’t getting enough light. As long as the lighting is the same the plant will continue to stretch. A very good friend of mine had the same issue. Finally due to its weakness the plant broke. The broken part was given to me and I just laid it on a pot of growing medium and left it alone in bright filtered light. It rooted along that long stem. New rosettes started forming along the stretched stem too. What’s been stretched will never unstretch, but with proper light new growth will be better and have the traditional rosette.

It looks like middle part is stretched - etiolated, and top more compact. Maybe it wasn't getting enough light previously?

Plant should be decapitated - beheaded. Read these threads BEHEADING PLANTS 1&2 to get advice and see photos on how to do it. Cut approx. where the red line is:

Leave bottom part potted and it will continue growing.

Remove approx. 4 leaves from cut part to get a clean piece of stem and insert into mix after letting cut part to callus. It doesn't take too long, approx. 2-3 hours or overnight. Do not water cut part for a while. You could keep newly potted top part in shadier spot for about 10 days - 2 weeks, and after that move gradually into good sunlight. Otherwise it will keep stretching as Tyler already mentioned above. You could do what he said, but doing it the way I suggest will give you more upright plant. Either way should work - your choice...

Top should be potted in separate pot. After it is well rooted (few months), it could be potted together with bottom part, but probably needing bigger pot. Or let it grow in it's own pot - your choice.

Leaves you take off could be propagated to grow new plants. They should be gently twisted off, not cut. You can simply put them on surface of mix to root, or slightly stick into mix - not too deep. Again, do not water for a while or they may rot. Roots and plantlets should start growing within few weeks:

Keep leaves in shadier spot until you see little plantlets growing, and then gradually move into god sunlight. Transplant new plants into individual pots when bigger than in photo; leaving 'mother' leaf attached unless it completely dried up. Or you can have few growing in same pot. Not all leaves always root, so don't be surprised if some don't - but most should.

When making new potting mix, make it well draining. Use sifted or rinsed perlite (or pumice) and mix with soil in 1:1 ratio. Mix in the photo has also grit in it, and is very well draining (grit and perlite in about equal parts, and less soil). Use new mix also when repotting succulents.

Many succulents will eventually grow longer stem, but that should be because of ageing, not lack of light. It will usually happen after a while, could be a year or few. That is when you should decapitate again.

Yes! It wasn't getting enough light as well as my other plants so I got a grow light.

I decided to go ahead and behead it where you suggested Rina! I pulled off more leaves than that - 10 total (I thought some of those ones below pointing downward would make it harder to stick in soil)

How can I tell when the leaves and stem have calloused over? It looks like the edges have turned white and curled in but I assume something like this will happen over the entire stem. The leaves look about the same though.

As for the mix, I made my cactus soil/perlite and I just saw the part about rinsing it now, and not sure what sifting is... is that okay? Pictured below is my mix.. not sure if that is 50/50 or if I added too much perlite... Also when I am ready to put the crown in the mix should it be similar to the one for the leaves - can I put it with the leaves or should that be separate too - or should the crown just go in my usual cactus soil?

Leaves and unrooted cutting ('the crown') could be in same pot; but usually it is better and easier to use separate. Use new mix for all, including any re-potting of succulents you do in future.

Sifting perlite is dome using same sieve and shaking it until dust falls out. BUT it may be easier to rinse it, since dust is not good to breathe and could irritate lungs. So just rinse it. Your mix looks ok, do not worry about too much perlite. Ratio 1:1 is approx; and less soil is better than too much.

Callusing is really drying or scabbing over of fresh cut or wound. It doesn't take too long. If piece is thin, it is less than hour. I suggested 2-3 hours just to be an safe side. Or you can leave them to callus overnight.

As you can see in photo I posted in previous post, some leaves are propped against the rim of container. That makes sure they stay upright and touch the mix. Many leaves will grow roots and plantlets even if just left without any mix, or just laying on surface of it - see below:.

So do not "overthink it" - do it, and let them be :)

Yeah... I ran out of soil after I already went out to get the perlite so I used some soil from a dehydrated and dying yucca tree (that was my mom's). The soil was only put in around fall I think and I pulled out as many roots as I could find... but should I go buy some new soil and make the mix again with rinsed perlite?

I also do have a liquid root stimulator that I use whenever I separate my aloe pups, could that be something that would help here too? Or is it best to just let them be without anything added?

Soil could be re-used, unless it is infected with some kind of disease, or not suitable. In general, it is better to use soil that contains little (or not at all) peat. Your mix could be ok, but how can we tell without seeing it? I often reuse older/previous mix if short...Here is part of a post written by Al (tapla) about "good soil":

I would like to think that everyone would prefer to use a medium that can be described as 'good' from the plant's perspective. How do we determine what a plant wants? Surprisingly, we can use %s established by truly scientific studies that are widely accepted in the greenhouse and nursery trades to determine if a medium is good or not good - from the plant's perspective, that is. Rather than use confusing numbers that mean nothing to the hobby grower, I can suggest that our standard for a good should be, at a minimum, that you can water properly. This means at any time during the growth cycle you should be able to water your plantings to beyond the point of saturation (so excess water is draining from the pot) without the fear of root rot or compromised root function due to (take your pick) an excessive volume of water or too little air in the root zone.

I think it is very reasonable to withhold the comparative adjective, 'GOOD', from media that can't be watered properly without compromising root function, or worse, suffering disease from one of the fungaluglies that cause root rot. I also think anyone wishing to make a case from the plant's perspective that a medium which can't be watered to beyond saturation w/o compromising root health can be called 'good', is fighting uphill against logic.

Whole post is in THIS CURRENT THREAD; you may want to read it.

Can't comment on using any root stimulator/rooting hormone since I never use it. Repotted hundreds of plants without any. Some ppl use it...

rina... brilliant tutorial ...

Yeah, I ran out in the middle of repotting other plants, and I really didn't want to go out a second time ahaha especially now. Here's a picture of the soil that was pulled out from the yucca tree pot. Pretty certain it just died from dehydration but my mom also thought I overwatered it we used to argue a lot over that plant ahaha.

I've used it with all of my aloe black gem pups and it's done the job, though I've never tried without it... the pup I moved last year already has a big pup of its own and five or so other shoots that started. I think it probably just speeds the initial progress. The instructions for it say to put it in a moistened rooting medium though, so not sure if it needs the moist soil or I can still use it in dry soil

It is difficult to judge soil from photos. From what I see in photos, I would add lots of inorganic ingredients. Aloe Black Gem = xAlworthia Black Gem is very easy to grow plant. It offsets easily. Pups can be left with original plant, or divided and potted separately. Clumps of it look pretty nice - JMO :) Pups with roots can be potted into moistened mix, do not think it needs to be rooting medium thou. I pot them in same mix I use for all other succulents. Even rootless pups will grow in it well. As any other succulent, Black Gem benefits from well draining potting mix. Over-watering could cause rotting, and it happens easier if lots of soil is used. Potting mix for succulents should not stay constantly wet, but dry up between watering. Did you buy just a very small bag of perlite? Or re-potted many plants?

Yeah I've always just used the same soil for my aloes and they all have done fine even without adding more perlite but maybe I should start to - I got a decent sized bag so I'll have it for a while. Some are in really small pots so sometimes I find their soil dries out faster but each week I check out their leaves and if they are still decently plump I leave them. I used to water the main plant too often, I think I avoided root rot but I lost all the original bigger leaves (two pups grew right in the middle of the the main one and it split it apart). I haven't seen any of the pups get bigger leaves really but now that the big leaves are gone I'm hoping the pups remaining in the main pot will stay together and grow bigger :)

Update on the echeveria: I decided to give the root stimulator a go but before I placed everything I did just mist the top of the soil enough just in case the stimulator needed it. All dry now. I also split the mix into two smaller pots so the leaves could be separate from the crown. Here's all three of them, sitting in a shady corner beside my desk

There is no need to mist soil surface prior to put leaves on/in it, sometimes it even helps rotting. I do not know about stimulator use; just read ones on bottle of rooting hormone to just dip end in it. If you keep rootless cutting too wet, no rooting hormone will help. If there are no roots, plant can't 'drink' anyway. I start watering when I see plantlets growing. That may take weeks. But there is plenty of water stored in mother leaf, so no need for extra. Some ppl advise to spray surface of mix after a while, but not immediately upon putting cuttings in/on it. I never spray them at all. Rooted hundreds of cuttings same way. But, that is JMO :)

Easy way to tell if mix has dried up is to use a bamboo-wooden skewer r chopstick, or thin dowel or stick with sharpened end. Insert deep into pot and leave in for few minutes (or longer if you want). When pulled out and dry - time to water.

Plant could get overcrowded - that is when repotting into bigger pot or dividing is better. Depends on 'look' you want. I usually let them grow for a while, since I like fuller pots of the same plant. But that is just my preference - pot them to your liking :)

And I divided above plants often, and some others too.

Ahhh okay I got worried because of what the instructions said but I've been reading that root stimulator doesn't always make a difference anyway. And that's good to know that the leaves don't drink anyway until they have roots, I will leave them untouched until I see roots and then just gently mist if needed. What would it look like if a leaf started to rot?

That is a good method, sounds easier than the moisture metre. I have one but I can never tell if it's accurate - in something I just watered within the hour it will start at 4 and immediately starts going down the moment I put it in.

The aloes I have in the main pot have plenty of room now that the big leaves are gone, so I'm going to let them fill it out. Also seems counter productive to split them all when they have big roots and lots of room to spread. I only really moved the pups I did when I was either making more room for others to grow or the growth of new pups between the bigger pup and the mum made the bigger pup looser. I also have one really tiny pup that accidentally came off when I was splitting other pups. It had a long root attached though.

Here's my aloe family - the ones in the solo cups and the tiny one were separated earlier in the year. The pup with the big home is the one that has the five or six little ones on the way - you can kind of see the pup growing right underneath it but it's especially brown right now