A near thing

Last summer Ironman went to Peru and brought me back some alpaca. In fact, he brought back lots of alpaca. 30 balls. Fingering weight. Two colors. It's gorgeous stuff, but since I wasn't sure what to do with it, I stuck it in the closet to marinate.

Recently I've come down with a major case of startitis. Whee - a shawl!...oooo, look over there, pretty fiber! Hmmm, I think I need a new sweater project... Some of this may have been encouraged by the lovely, but unseasonable weather that has been lingering in the Houston area, and the rest of it by the Website That Shall Not Be Named. But I found a lovely, retro pattern that was appealing, and decided maybe it would be a good fit for my lovely alpaca.

To recap:

Alpaca sweater.
Fingering weight.
Black.
In a Houston summer.

Does this seem like a good idea to anyone?

Thankfully, I swatched yesterday, and have been deterred from my path of madness. The yarn is gorgeously soft, knits up into a nice stockinette fabric, but the cables are pretty appalling. As in, they disappear into mush. This may change after a bath, but I'm not optimistic. So I think the alpaca will disappear back into the stash closet for a while longer, although I've got some ideas about other uses for it.

Do you see a cable here? I don't see a cable here. Nope, nothing to see here.

The North Roe shawl is still a shapeless blob of bright green and brown, but it's getting larger. I'm well in to the second chart and am looking forward to the last.

Unfortunately, I've reached that stage in shawl knitting where the rows take forever (~3 rows/bus ride, not conducive to rapid progress), and it's starting to drag. This may also contribute to the startitis a bit - I'm not going to mention the other swatching action that is ongoing. Best not to confess to too much methinks!