Hemlock ring blanket

Here's the progress I've made so far on the Hemlock Ring blanket. I'm loving the star pattern in the center, but I'm dreading the monotony of 500 yards of feather-and-fan.

I'm using Knitpicks options needles, size US 10 with a 40 inch cable. I have a set of interchangeable circular needles, but the longest cable length is too small to make a blanket, and although there are connectors to join two cables, the result is a rather large bump in the cable that makes for a really miserable knitting experience. I  really like the flexibility of the Knitpicks options cable, it allowed me to use the magic loop method until the circumference of the blanket was big enough to use the entire cable length. And the join of the needles and cable is pretty smooth. The $10 or so I spent on the Knitpicks needle is totally worth it for the amount of time I'll spend knitting this blanket.