Ugly lace

This little bit of ugly is all I have so far of Jared Flood's Rock Island.  The edging is knit in a long thin strip, then the body of the shawl is picked up and knit in ever decreasing rows toward the center.

I've knit lace before, so I know that it sort of looks like hell until you finish and block it, but this has a particularly scrubby look.  It's sort of making it not fun to work on because it feels like all I'm producing is a hot little mess.  

The finished versions on Ravelry are extremely impressive (the ones I don't like are almost all either because of bad yarn choice or bad blocking.)  Since I love this yarn and I know it's necessary to block the snot out of lace I think I'm on a path that will eventually pay off.  I started this in May just after school got out, but haven't really worked on it at all since school started.  I'm hoping to pick it up again, but hoping doesn't put stitches on the needles.