Knitting... with pencils?

You may wonder why there is a picture of Soleil (knitted in Noro Lily) in a post titled "Linen is Weird." But there is a connection, if you bear with me.

First, I want to brag about the fact that the knitting of Soleil is finished. This one has been on the needles for quite a while, including a time where I set it aside to decide whether I could take the weird pooling or whether it needed a trip to the frog pond. As you can see, I finished knitting, and you know, I think I like it. Horizontal stripes and all!

So now, I'm blocking for the first time (no, I've never blocked anything before! Although, I'm thinking of disassembling this and blocking it before reassembling.. I did a shoddy job of finishing it so it needs disassembling anyway, I think), and I'm doing it with a circular item (knitted in the round) and a cotton/silk blend to boot. Hopefully this will come out okay. I'm blocking it approximately 1/3 at a time, so that it fits on my ironing board.

Meanwhile, now that this is blocking, I have finally been able to cast-on the Moss Grid Hand Towel from Mason Dixon Knitting. I've been wanting to play with the linen yarn (they say it softens up the more you wash it, and it's machine wash AND dry.. does it get any better?), and now I am. And let me tell you, it's strange.

I'm working with Euroflax Linen Originals.. has anyone out there worked with this yarn? Does it grow or shrink or neither, when washed? I'm knitting a towel, so I'm too lazy to knit a swatch for a rectangular item that is not particularly size dependant, but I'm still curious...