Grafting those cables

At last! At last! The big knit is over and the cabled strap is ready to join together. Now comes the bit I haven't been looking forward to. Grafting. That pesky Kitchener stitch. I remember the last time I tried this on my little rose pink shrug and the stocking stitch was fine but the rib was so, so messy. But, that was then and maybe I'll have better luck with more practice:-)

So here are the ends all ready for grafting. Only 10 stitches so not a mammoth task, except some are knit and some are purl. I went back to Knitwitch's video for grafting on You Tube and refreshed my memory and while I was watching it, it suddenly occurred to me that I just reverse the process for purl. Keeping it in the right order so you have a knit over the knit and a purl over the purl would be an interesting challenge but the bag is so nearly finished!!! I will master this!

So off I went and damn me, if it didn't work first time! I had got myself psyched up for a major hoo-ha and knitting being thrown down in a fit of peak. But no! It all went smoothly. The knitting gods have been shining on me this afternoon and I am very grateful!! Can you see the join? It's pretty much invisible - high five! I know there is a little disturbance where it fits together as a zigzag with the stitches fitting in between each other and it leaves a little kink at the edges but it's a whole lot better than I was expecting. Woo hoo! I am soooo pleased! And I'm feeling a little bit cleverer than when I woke up this morning:-)

Kitchener stitch is sussed!

Now, all I have to do is blanket stitch the strap to the bag and get a pretty button and it's finished! I may even finish it tonight - I can't wait to see it finished! I'm all excited:-)