Pick and Awl

Next to perma-lock needles, I'd say the knot tying tool that I use the most is an ice pick. Picks are helpful in pulling out strands when tightening a knot like a turks heads. They are used to to work in some space between two strands to insert a needle for pulling an additional strand through a knot. I use the awl above less frequently than my ice pick, but I find that the tapered shaft can be useful for working in space between two strands. It's also a little more stout that the ice pick and can be useful if the cord is stiff or a knot is really tight. At the base of the shaft is tied 4 bight turks head. Over the balance of the handle and partially covering the turks head is a pineapple knot with a 6 bight turks head base.  Take your time if you try something like this. I was little rushed, and you can see some gaps in the knot at the widest part of the handle. I included a picture of my ice pick- Do note that only some of the knot work on that handle is mine. My father did the original covering. I put the two bight turks head and the 4 lead by 3 bight turks head on the base of the pick. The two bight turks head is especially helpful for gripping the pick.

Paracord Pineapple Knot Fob from a 2 Bight Turks Head

These are a couple fobs I made using pineapple knots. A pineapple knot is a turks head with another turks head interwoven within. Poking around the web it seems that when most folks tie pineapple knots they utilize a 4, 6 or 8 bight turks head as the base knot. I got to thinking that it would be easy to apply the same methodology to a 2 bight turks head. The first time I tried it I utilized some small polypro chord, but I had a tough time keeping it straight as I made the two bight turks head really long. After thinking about it I decided it would look much better if the knot was tied out of all paracord. You can see the two versions I made here, one in black/green, and the other in blue/orange. The knot at the base is a knife lanyard/lanyard knot. I also made a slide show video for the pineapple knot which is below. I am normally a proponent of making knots "snug", but if you attempt this I would suggest you make it "tight" so as to keep the ends tucked.

Junior Pineapple Knot Walking Stick

I gave away walking sticks to some friends at the holidays.  Our group of five year old's children expressed some interest in having walking sticks of their own, so this is the prototype.  This is a half-stick of what I usually make with an oil finish and a rubber stopper to keep the end from sliding around.  Around it is tied a type 1 pineapple knot in blue and red that originated from a 4 bight turks head. Up until now I have tied pineapple knots from instructions with diagrams and over-under instructions.  This one I tied without instructions which is an accomplished for me.  If you would like information on tying a long pineapple knot, KHWW has a tutorial.

Hand Saw Clip Lanyard

This is a hand saw lanyard that I made for the hand saw I use to cut walking sticks and such.  The core of the lanyard is a piece of black paracord.  Over top of the paracord I tied a 4 strand continuous or spiral crown sinnet (click spiral version in this tutorial), keeping all of the hitches going in the same direction.  While I don't consider myself much of a "crown & wall-er", I will say a crown sinnet builds quickly and looks nice.  I did make a mistake and there is a mis-stitch in the sinnet which you can see in the foreground of the picture (boo).  However, by the time I figured it out I didn't feel like taking 3 inches of sinnet apart to fix it.

Then I used this tutorial from the Pineapple Knot Forum to tie Type 1, 2 pass pineapple knots from 7Lx6B turks heads to cover the sinnet ends.  The tapered end nature of the pineapple knot makes it useful for this purpose.