I started this shawl from the book "Vogue Knitting; Shawls on the Go". It's called the Diagonal Drop Stitch Shawl. It's a very simple pattern with increases each side every 2nd row. The cables are a simple 6 cable left to right cross and the 'rib' between them have a unique twist so that when you get to the end and start decreasing they don't loosen when you drop the in-between stitches and make ladders on either side of the  cable rows. It looks really sweet!  I call it my "fall off the wagon" shawl because I bought this yarn from a Yahoo group - my first major deviation from my ailing yarn diet. I suspect it's hand-dyed and frogged because it is a coral-pink which is not a stock color for Mission Falls DK super wash which it was listed as. It came in pre-wound center pull balls with no labels. I burnt a small piece and it is indeed wool as there was no melting so it has no synthetic. I originally planned to make it out of Schachenmayer's Mega which is a 14 ply super wash in a yummy pastel blue but then I thought about the ladders in the shawl and decided that plied yarn would probably get really splitty and not look really nice. This spun yarn has a fairly tight twist so the ladders will keep their definition and give the right effect, I think.
The nice thing about a shawl is that gauge only matters for your needle size so that the stitches are a pleasing size/gauge. I have already passed the pattern stitch count but find that the shawl is still too narrow. Because it's just a stitch repeat I think I'll make it a little wider yet (until I'm done 3 balls) and stop increasing. I'll do the straight, middle section, then when I'm down to 3 balls start my decrease rows. I do realize the shawl will get a little wider one those stitches are dropped but to me, something of this weight can tolerate being a little more generous in size.
You can see from the pic that the book is really small (about 6x9") which I think is super! It fits so nicely in my knitting basket. A refreshing change from the usual 10x12" books that you end up having to photocopy the page you need because the book is too huge to keep with you because it won't fit in your lap or your basket. I can't say I'm overly impressed with the yarns they chose for some of the other patterns, especially the one on the cover. It looks poorly constructed to boot because the seams are raised and to me it just looks inside out! The book was inexpensive and I bought it on Amazon.ca I can certainly see myself using some of the other patterns and adding some lace or texture stitches to them to give them the something 'extra' they really lack!