You can use the tail remaining after completing your frame,

It usually looks nice to make a drape be the same width and height. So as this drape is 3 fingers down…

…I will make it 4 fingers wide as well.

Put your first Cow Hitch here. Tying this outfit will go much more quickly and will look much better if you tie your Cow Hitches consistently and using good technique. Let’s go over that to make sure we are all on the same page:

Keep your lines in order as they come from the prior knot. Keep them parallel and not twisted. Lay the tail on top of what you are tying it to and clip it in place with one hand.

Once my Cow Hitch use complete, this line will be one of the two that are inside of the Cow Hitch (you’ll be able to better see that in a moment) For consistency, I am always going to have these ‘inner’ lines lay on top of the outer lines when doing the draping. Just stick with me for a moment and this will become more clear.

Hold the node in place with one hand while you run your finger under the line and hook the tail.

Pull the tail through…

…

This is the first half of the Cow Hitch. Make sure the lines stay in order and don’t twist.

Lay the tail on top of itself. Note that the outside line is above the inside line here in this horizontal section.

Hold that in place while you reach behind the frame line and hook the tail.

Pull the tail up behind the frame line…

I’m going to let go of the knot for a moment to point out something important: Note how the line that was on the outside on the right-hand side of the knot is again on the outside here on the left-hand side of the knot.

(I’m grabbing the knot again to keep it stable while I pulled the tail through behind the frame.)

…

If this is a long tail pull, you can hook the tail with your pinkie like this to keep the tail from flailing around and possibly whipping your partner.

Once the tail is fully pulled through…

You need the tail to come back down through here.

Reach through and grab the tail.

Pull the tail through.

It can be helpful to grip this point to keep it the loop open while you’re doing the tail pull.

Complete the tail pull.

Tighten.

You can then continue on to make the next Cow Hitch.

Before we do that, take a close look at this one. Note how clean it looks.

Note how the outside two line coming out of the knot naturally fall behind the inside two lines.

This arrangement allows for the tightest Cow Hitch with the greatest grip on the anchor line. Coincidentally it’s also the most attractive.

Again, we’re going for consistency, so once the knot is created and dressed, take a moment to double check its placement. In this example, I wanted something 3 fingers wide by…

…3 fingers tall.

Now repeat that pattern around the rest of this layer.

If you make the Cow Hitch the same way every time, eventually you’ll start to be able to do so very quickly and very consistently.

You don’t have to make your Cow Hitch is be the same size every time. You could make other artistic choices like this.

But for purposes of this example, I’m going to make them the same all the way around…

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…

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Once you have completed the first row, there are several options for adding more rows!