FO: Mentor Cowl

When someone does an absolute bang-up job on helping me out, I love to thank them with something homemade.  For my first year as a full-fledged English teacher, my college assigned me a mentor to help with any questions I had about the day-to-day nuances and goings-on.  She teaches in the English department as well, and has been an incredible help to me as I stumbled through lesson planning and figuring out administration stuff all at the same time.  If I had questions, she was happy to meet with me, and even gave me her own assignments and examples so I didn't feel quite so lost in the woods.
To thank her, I went to my favorite squishy yarn as my way of saying "Thank you"- with a cowl. :)

Pattern: Marian, by Jane Richmond (I told you I like her stuff!)
Yarn: Squishy Malabrigo Rasta- super-chunky-thick-crazy stuff.  It's close to the size of my pinky in diameter.  Just ridiculous.  In the color "Oxido"- great variation of colors, as is all Malabrigo stuff :)
Needles: Size 17- so large that it was awkward to knit at first.

Timeline: I knit this up on April 8th.  That's it.  Cast on in the morning and knit for like a half hour, then graded for 8 hours, finished the cowl up with CSI after evening climbing and dinner.  No problem.
Worst Part:  I originally started this pattern with some leftover Cascade Eco Wool that I had lying around- the brown looked like the dirty snow outside, so I knew the only way I could finish was if I changed the wool up.  Knitting halfway through the cowl at first wasn't the best way to find this out, but at least it was only halfway...

Best Part: Getting a knit done in one evening.  I am actually borrowing the needles from a friend of mine, and I'm tempted to buy my own set of the crazy-huge needles for more Marian cowls to gift away.  Seriously.  I could knit like 5 Christmas presents in one hardcore day of knitting.  Who wouldn't want to do that?

Oh- see the snow behind me?  We're supposed to get more of that soon.  Probably tonight.
I'm a hardcore Minnesotan, but getting more snow at this time of the year... even I'm getting a little snowed-out.