Project Start-itis

I got some lovely sock yarn at the Southern California Handweavers’ Guild Weaving & Fiber Festival back in November and am finally ready to do something with it.

I have two skeins of Sock-aholic from Knitters Brewing Co., one in Jungle Juice and one in Grasshopper.

I've been wanting to make the Catkin shawl, by Carina Spencer but I wasn't happy with the result when I worked up the swatch.  Even on size 4 needles the gauge seemed too loose, which just made it look sloppy to me.

The other skein is a lovely purple hand dyed superwash wool from Bee Mice Elf.

Another pattern I've been drooling over is Veera Välimäki's Color Affection shawl, so I'm going to do some swatching to see whether these will work.  If not, it's back to sifting through patterns for me!