What the heck, shawl?

Okay, so say hello to the shawl I've been working on. (It also says hello.) The color actually looks pretty accurate here, and you also get to meet my bedspread. Not bad for an iPhone photo, I think.

Anyway. It's gone pretty well. I've only had the occasional problem with it. One of those problems? In the middle of class, one of my acrylic needles (or the acrylic needle part of the circulars I've been using, rather) snapped in two! No more of those needles for me. Certainly explains why they only cost, like, $2. So I've had to perform a little bit of knitting surgery, and I've done well, I think.

But, of course, the title of this post implies that something is up. And something is up. And it will be explained. First, here's the pattern I'm using (on Ravelry, natch): Eyelet Shawl. I've done well enough following that. At the beginning, I kept losing count of my rows, but then I downloaded the Vogue Knitting app for my phone, and that's helped out a lot. However, when it comes to those center stitches (the ones that create the eyelets down the middle), they...well, it's like the middle keeps shifting. I'm not moving the stitch marker or anything, but it looks like the center keeps moving to the left! Maybe this picture will help a bit:

 

Wow, the camera likes to shift the color a bit. Trust me when I say it's not this magenta. But see how the marker is to the right of what looks like the center? That's happened a couple of times, so I just move the marker over a few stitches (usually four, to be sure that there's an appropriate number for the yo, k2tog eyelet row) to the one that actually looks like the center. Something tells me that this is probably a bad idea, but it looks like it's working out, for the most part. It's so weird, though, because I can't even GET to the marker until I actually make all of the stitches.

Basically, what I'm wondering is - if I'm following the pattern to a T (which is easy enough now that I'm keeping track of rows), why is this happening? Or is it all in my head and I need to leave the marker alone? I have this (maybe irrational?) fear of blocking this out (which I assume I can do with pins and a towel?) and having the middle be kind of wavy. But, if you look at the picture to the right...it's done some other kind of weird stuff. But it's always made it back to the middle before. It's sort of like it "adopts" stitches from other rows to become the center. (I hadn't moved the marker at this point.) I don't know what's up. But the shift kind of bothers me. Any advice from the much-more-experienced set? 

I've beefed up my speed on this thing, so I might be able to get it finished in the next week, which would be nice. I'm wanting to start a hat and scarf for my mom for Christmas, but I'm using a yarn that isn't very popular (in Amethyst). Luckily, someone's already making the hat I want to make, so it can be done, but that leaves the scarf. I'm wondering - do you all know of any scarves that would match that hat? (It'll be my first cabling endeavor. Which might be a bad idea. But I'm giving it a shot because I can. And my mom will appreciate it either way.)

Until next time!