Tendrils has begun...

I spent some time on Friday evening stringing beads onto the HipKnits silk - not the simplest task in the world of knitting as the beads were a snug fit on the yarn and moving them along wore out the silk and it became a bit splitty. I've strung 500 onto the first skein just to make sure I've got enough so fingers crossed that there were no knots in the yarn that I didn't spot!

The pattern looked a bit daunting at first, but once I got into it, it wasn't too bad and was fairly easy to memorise. The silk has absolutely no 'give' so I'm being careful not to knit too tight. I've already had one incident when attempting to k2tog in a slightly tighter region when the yarn broke so I'm going fairly gingerly now.


I like longish wraps and I'm not entirely sure I've got enough yarn (though I have more yardage that the pattern asks for, I think the silk is behaving differently from the yarn in the pattern). I've decided to knit up the first skein and see what length I've got to - if I'm past 12 inches then I'll keep going, as five feet is an acceptable length for a wrap. If not then I think I'll rip it out and reknit it with one fewer pattern repeat in the width.

The fabric created is wonderfully soft and has a beautiful drape to it. The beads don't show too well at the moment but I think they should show better after blocking.


I'm going to allow myself to knit a ball-worth of this project every time I finish a piece of Betty. The fact that I have now cast on for this project means that Betty now has a left front. Here's a picture of the back and left front blocking. The sizing has come up pretty well and the bias seems to have been rectified.