Spend a quid - win a shawl! Potentially!

I, like a lot of people have been very shocked by the recent earthquakes and the tsunami in New Zealand and Japan and it got me thinking about what i can do to help. the answer is: not a lot really.
I can offer no practical help but i can try and raise some money so when i saw the Japanese Garden Shawl (rav link) designed by Wendy Johnson (who is donating all profits from the pattern sales to the American Red Cross) i knew exactly what to do!

I checked through the stash but found nothing with a suitable yardage so i popped over to Stash Fine Yarns and picked up some Aracaunia Ranco in this gorgeous pinkypurple - it's not a luxury yarn but it is lovely and soft.

It arrived on Saturday but what with my busy weekend i didn't get to play with it until yesterday! I wound one skein up and spent the day knitting a small sample. This is what you get if you knit just Chart A as it is with no extra repeats. I'm happy with the colours, my needle size, knitting from the chart and everything so i'm casting on the shawl proper today!

So how is this helping?
My plan is to take donations of £1 per entry to a prize draw with the 1st prize being the finished shawl. I have had offers of donations for other prizes as well but i will post about them when the details are finalised :o)
(I still have details about how to take the donations to iron out as well but as i haven't started the shawl yet i figure i have a little time before i need to worry about that too much!!
I am hoping that the money i raise will be split equally between the British Red Cross and Medecins Sans Frontieres if i can just work out how to do it ;o)