Everlasting Bagstopper

I was quite new to the online knitting scene in the summer of 2007 when the Everlasting Bagstopper was published at Knitty.com. Having never heard of Hemp for Knitting or AllHemp6, I still put the pattern on my mental “I wanna knit that” list.

Two years later, I did!

Stretched a bit so you can see it's plenty wide

Of course, I have two skeins of AllHemp6 wound and sitting somewhere in the stash, but when I saw the Sapphire colorway, I knew that’s what I really wanted to use.


I was a little worried the first time I scrunched it all up into a ball that I had put the drawstring in a little too low. It wouldn’t have been a bad thing if I put it a row or two higher up, but it really is fine where it is.

My very favorite sandals included for scale. US 9, Teva Mush sandals!

I found the drawstring at the “good” Joann’s, out by the airport. When I went to weave it in, I decided that if I had a bead that would work, that would make it a little easier to pull the drawstring closed.

I DID have an appropriate bead!

Earlier in the week, I had purchased some navy-with-white-polka-dot grosgrain ribbon for handles for this bag. But at Joann’s, I found what I felt was the PERFECT ribbon for this bag.


It is woven, however, and therefore has a ton of loose threads on the reverse side. So I sewed the 1-3/8” ribbon to a 1-1/2” black grosgrain for the handles. I could have done a better job (witness the slight ripple), but I still like it. All in all, I’m quite pleased with the final effort! In fact, I like it well enough that I’ve already cast on for a second one, which will be a gift.

Everlasting Bagstopper

Pattern: Everlasting Bagstopper from Knitty.com
Size: It’s a bag
Yarn: AllHemp6, 2 skeins
Color: Sapphire
Source: Bloomin Yarns, McMurray, Pa.
Needles: US 5 and US 10.5, both from my KA Switch set
Started: 28 June 2009
Finished: 18 July 2009
Mods: Knit it taller than the pattern called for, but not tall enough that I’d run out of yarn. I was afraid that if I knit all the yarn, it would be whacking my ankles when full. I also cast on using Judy’s Magic Cast On, and picked up the sides of the garter rectangle as I would for a sock toe. That meant that I had many more stitches than the 116 the pattern suggested, but as long as I had an even total number of stitches, it didn't matter.