As promised, I’m back this week with a small tutorial for the beaded bow stitch, which features heavily in the Holiday Lights tam pattern. For the curious, this stitch took it’s inspiration from the “Little Butterfly” stitch in Barbara Walker’s first Treasury of Knitting Patterns. Ready? Here we go!
First, you’ll need to string beads onto your yarn. You know that little trick with the crochet hook where you don’t have to string beads ahead of time? It’s very nice, but it won’t work here, so don’t do it. Load up that yarn:
The bow stitch is worked over five stitches and six rows. On row 1, we set up the stitch as follows: K1, then move the yarn to the front of the work and slide two beads up the yarn to the base of the right needle. With the yarn still in front, slip THREE stitches:
Then finish with a K1. You should now have a “float” of yarn across the front of the work, with two beads on it:
Work the next three rows in stockinette. Here’s a better picture of what that float will look like:
On row 5, we’ll finish things off. K2, then insert the right hand needle under the float from row 1, so that there is a bead on each side of the needle:
Make a yarn over, and pull it back through the float, creating a new “stitch”:
K1, and then pass this yarn over stitch over to finish creating the “bow”, then K2 to finish the repeat:
Work one final row in stockinette stitch, and you’re done!
