after a slow start to my olympic project, i think i have caught up (i did not have time to swatch ahead as i was still spinning the yarn on thursday!).

i started off late on friday by swatching and did not come up with anything i liked very much. saturday i started afresh and put together a combination of stitches i liked a lot:
hourglass eyelets for the center square, triangles and lace for the middle band, and madiera cascade for the deep edge band.

i love the way the textures of these stitches contrast when they are next to each other. even in the same color yarn, you can see each pattern distinctly. i also really love the progression of scale in this combination; as your eye moves out from the center, the scale of each pattern will get larger, and yet, no one pattern seems dominant in a bad way. the proportions of one pattern as compared to another seem perfect to me. oh, now i am SO excited!! (ok, i am calming myself, even I can see that i’m overdoing it). what i’m trying to say (poorly) is this is one of the the best parts; having decided what to do, knowing it’s a good idea, and being poised to begin. the immediate future holds nothing but promise!

a few hours later . . .
ok, finally got started for real. this is the third try; the first time i cast on, got started, and then had a better idea about how to arrange the pattern around the center. then i cast on again and got to the point where i wanted to photograph it before placing the stitches on a circular needle, when, to my dismay, i saw a mistake in the photo, and had to rip it back. here is the last you will see of the shawl in a flat state; now it’s time to put it on circular needles and we won’t really get to see what it looks like til it’s bound off.

and still later . . .
so far, so good; this is it after the first evening’s work.

i still feel like i’m behind (behind WHO??), but feel courageous about catching up.