Tying a knitted beaded scarf

I knitted a beaded scarf for my mother, and one for her friend. These are *all* the rage at my local knitting store, Colorado Fiber Arts. They are easy to make and they really come out very nice. There is something terribly glamorous and dramatic about all of those beads. It gives the scarf some real heft. If you are interested, you can contact my knitting store's owner, Emily, and see about mail-ordering a kit for yourself.

Emily is so smart - she taught me this method of tying the scarves. Clever, eh?

Isn't it nice?

A closer look.

Here's how - it's super easy to do - -

First, you fold the scarf in half, and put it around your neck. Then, you pull one end through from left to right...
...then you pull the other end through the loop from right to left.
Tug on the ends to tighten it up a little bit.

Aim the "knot" towards one shoulder, and there you go!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This is a very quick knit, and super easy as it's 100% garter stitch. The way this scarf is made, you knit from one end to the middle, then stop and set it aside, while you knit the other half. Then, you join the two halves in the middle.

I made a couple of changes - - on the scarf pictured above, I made the "tails" much larger to exagerate the fish-tail look, and I really like the effect. Also, instead of the join recommended in the pattern, I grafted it instead and I was thrilled with the outcome.

This how I grafted it - - when I was finished with the first half, I dropped the working yarn and picked up some similar gauge waste yarn and knitted about 5 ridges (10 rows) of garter stitch. Then I bound off and set it aside.

I knitted the second half and stopped with 8 beads* (see note below) left to spare, then knitted 5 ridges of garter stitch in waste yarn, and bound off.

Now, I held the two halves together in the middle, and following the general idea of Ms. Neatby's "sock toe chimney" advice, I grafted to two halves together. It worked so well - you can just oh so barely tell where the join is, and this is only because, architecturally speaking, the scarf is not the exact same from either end, and the rows of beads don't line up exactly perfectly, but almost perfectly. It's one of those things that *no one* would ever notice. I'd show you how it looks but I didn't think to photograph the join before I sent the scarves off. Silly me. They really did come out very nice.

When grafting, you'll take all of the beads off of the yarn which you use for grafting, and thread them on when it is time to place a bead. Due to the problem mentioned above, you will need to place a bead on the back side of the scarf and one on the front side in the very next stitch. This might not be readily apparant, but it will make sense when you are doing the grafting.

Weave in all ends and you are done!

Enjoy!

*The truth is that I didn't stop with 8 beads left to spare, I stopped with ***4*** beads left over because this is what I thought I needed. I was wrong... Until I had the project in my hands, I didn't realize that I would be placing beads on the front and the back of the scarf, I was planning on only needing them for the front. Sigh. So, I went on a mad bead scramble which went something like this, "YIPPEE, there's one behind the sofa!" "Yeah, there is still a bead in the pocket of my jeans!" "Hooray - there's one in the bottom of my knitting bag!" "Let's see... where did I step on that bead in my bare feet.... oh yeah, in the kitchen... Oh Glory Day, HERE IT IS!!! Yep, that's about how it was. I was in a huge panic, but I found them all! I found another one just this morning under the rug that my knitting rocker sits on. See, I had a minor bead stringing accident...