In Honor of My Birthday

I'm gonna share this pattern because this is my birthday week.

There's a reason why I created this design. Upon learning how to do bead knitting I was drawn into needle bead weaving because I could make such cool straps for my bead knitted amulet bags. Well, my daughter was intrigued with my beading. Especially when I started learning the Peyote stitch. In fact, she has become quite an accomplished beader since then.

During one of our conversations we talked about making a pendant that would be sort of like a banner with a dragon on it, in the medieval kind of way. (Both my daughters are very into dragons.) Daughter's birthday was coming up so I thought I'd try my hand at creating something like that in Peyote as a gift for her. After several days of weaving and un-weaving and swearing and cursing-due to what was my lack of knowledge in Peyote stitch techniques, I finally shouted at the Fates "I could knit this faster!" Thus, an idea was born (and husband was startled out of his wits). Four hours later, I'd made this.



These are the instructions for making the pendant. You get to come up with your own idea for the strap, only because the instructions for this strap were on a web site that no longer exists. I hope you enjoy making it.

Dragon Banner Necklace

A knit beaded pendant

Finished Size: Approximately 1½ inches wide by 3½ inches long.

Materials: 1 ball of size 8 pearl cotton, 1 hank (28 grams) of size 11 seed beads, a gold dragon charm 2½ inches long, one necklace the length of your choice that will fit through a half inch casing. Beads for fringe (Model used size 11 seed beads in main color(mc) and bronze, 15 size-3 bugle beads, and 15 4-mm accent beads), beading thread.

Tools: Size 0000 needles, tapestry needle, beading needle.

Gauge: Not important.

Abbreviations: K = Knit, K2tog = knit 2 together, sl1b = insert needle into next stitch, slip 1 bead up to the needle so it will lie between the stitches, st(s) = stitch(es)

Note: In the model, a pinch of bronze beads was added to the main color beads before stringing onto the pearl cotton.

String or transfer 3 yards of beads onto the pearl cotton.

Begin casing:
Cast on 16 sts.

Right side facing you-- Row 1: Knit all sts.

Wrong side facing you-- Row 2: K1, sl1b. Repeat across ending with K1.

Repeat rows 1 and 2 until piece measures 1½ inches from cast on edge.

Begin body:

Next Row: K1, sl1b. Repeat across ending with K1.

Repeat this row until piece measures 3 inches from beginning, ending with a wrong side row facing you.

Decrease as follows:

Row 1: K2tog. *sl1b, K1. Repeat from * across.

Row 2: K1, sl1b. Repeat across ending with K1.

Repeat these two rows until there is one stitch left.

Bind off.

Fringe:

Using 2 yards of beading thread on beading needle, anchor the thread to one lower corner of the banner. String 1 bronze seed bead, 5 mc, 1 bronze, 5 mc, 1 bugle, 7 mc, 1 4mm, 3 mc onto thread. Thread needle back through beads starting with the 4mm. Knot to bottom of banner, thread the needle through edge over to next stitch and repeat from * across until there are 15 fringes evenly across the bottom. Knot off the beading thread and weave in the ends.

Finishing: Fold the casing in half with wrong sides together. With the tapestry needle and a strand of pearl cotton, sew cast-on edge of casing to wrong side of banner just above the beaded section. Sew charm to center front just below the top. Thread a chord or necklace of your choice through the casing.

Copyright © 2005 Linda Jo Park. All rights reserved.