Pads win!!!

So yesterday was my very first trip to Dodger Stadium. I went because the Padres were playing. As much as I wanted to be the outsider and wear my Padres t-shirt, I couldn't find it and had to settle for wearing my World Baseball Classic shirt instead.
I was sitting next to my husband's cousin, who is a die-hard Dodger fan, and he kept nudging me every time they scored. However, he did get quiet in the 4th inning when Kevin Kouzmanoff hit a home run and put the Pads up by 4 runs. It was looking like I wasn't gonna see Trevor close the game, but the Dodgers did come back enough to make the game interesting and sure enough, in the bottom of the ninth, it was Trevor Time. He came out of the bullpen to booing, for heaven's sake! But at least some fans did give him the respect, calling him the "greatest closer in the history of baseball". Even my husband's cousin pretty much knew it was over when Trevor took the mound.
Oh, and they charge $12 for beer at Dodger Stadium. Is that crazy or what? I had an almost front row view of a guy chug his beer as everyone around him cheered.

FO: Legwarmers

One week and one day after graduation, the legwarmers are finished (and gifted about 30 seconds after the last tail is woven in):

The pattern is "Super Easy Legwarmers" from Last Minute Knitted Gifts.I used one strand of Plymouth Encore in an ice blue color with one strand of Misti Alpaca Laceweight in a much darker blue. I really like how the two colors combined.
She's thrilled with them!

So what took so long? Well, the Independent Study period for my class started on Sunday, and so I've been busy being a good student so as not to fall behind. I also got my new laptop about 2 weeks ago but haven't been able to post pictures cuz I was trying to get the legwarmers done. I actually did an unboxing, I'll post those pics eventually, but I just have to show you this:

This was printed on the bag/sleeve that the laptop came in. I'm guessing it's the new universal sign for "Choke Hazard"?

One and a half FO's

Graduation has come and gone, but I'm not too late with these items, one finished and one half:

The Gryffindor-colored beanie is for my son's friend Tony, who is a huge Harry Potter fan. I used Knitty's Halfdome, the large adult size, and decided on three stripes because I thought it looked cute that way.

The one finished legwarmer is for a young girl who works with us, she does ballet and had jokingly asked me to make her some legwarmers when I first started knitting. She doesn't know I'm making them. I brought this one into work yesterday and all of my coworkers were impressed. Now I just have to finish the other one in a reasonable amount of time. Here's my progress:

Yes, I have my work cut out for me. I'm really hoping to get it done this weekend so I can concentrate on my independent reading for school. The good thing is that I can probably get some knitting done at work today.

FO: Music Notes Dishcloths

I actually finished these more than a week ago, but since I needed to package them for gifting I finally got around to taking a picture of them. The top 2 are Sugar n Creme dishcloth cotton in Burgundy and Camel, and the bottom one is Elann Adara in Cinnabar. I used a bamboo stitch variation on that one. The dishcloths are for my son's Band Director, who is getting married in July.

And now I get to show off some gift yarn!
La Jefita brought this back for me from Alaska. It's from a company called Raven Frog Fiber Arts, and this beautiful color is called Stormy Seas.
Have another look:
The yarn has all these little loops going through it, which will probably make it slow-going to knit, but hey, it's gift yarn!

I'm a grad student!

I got official notice of my acceptance today, I'll be starting grad school in the next few weeks! Yes, it will cut into my knitting time, but I hope to find a happy medium.
Meanwhile, I need to attempt a provisional cast on for the Tetris Baby Blanket, modified to have a garter stitch border instead of the mock crochet one.

Tetris Baby Blanket

I only have 2 projects on the needles right now, and ever since I finished the skull armwarmers (let's face it, they're waaay to big to be called wristwarmers) I've been meaning to start on the baby blanket for my friend Hazel. I'm glad I procrastinated about it, because while browsing the Knittyboard yesterday I came upon a pattern that jumped out and screamed "I'm the one you should make!"
The pattern, created by gracielou on the Knittyboards, is called Tetris Baby Blanket with Mock Crochet Edge. I absolutely fell in love with it at first sight, and I know that it will be perfect for my friend and her boyfriend.
I already have 12 balls of Knitpicks Crayon for said blanket; the original is done in Sugar n Cream so I knew that I was going to work a few things out. Firstly, Crayon is DK weight while Sugar n Cream is worsted, and while I'd originally planned to use 2 strands of Crayon, I thought I should swatch just to see how the yarn felt both single and double. First time I've had to swatch, and I did 2 of them! Aren't you proud of me?

The blue is the single strand using size 5 needles; the red is double on size 7s. At first I thought the single would be alright, but the red just feels more substantial. And boy does it use up the yarn fast!
I just finished placing an order for the rest of the yarn I'll need, plus a few skeins of sock yarn thrown in to get free shipping. I've already charted my colors, subbing orange and red for the denim blue and violet. According to my swatch, my blanket should be about 20 inches across.
I also have some promising news on the school front; today I emailed the program coordinator and she replied back that she still hasn't heard from the Graduate College. She suspects that it's my low GPA that's holding up the process, but she did tell me that she wrote a memo on my behalf. At least someone has some confidence in me!

It's been too quiet...not a good sign

It's been more than a week since I heard from the Masters Program I applied to. I'm accepted as a Provisional Student, but that requires approval from the Graduate College. They had told me before Memorial Day that the situation would be resolved soon...and as of now I still haven't heard anything.

I wish they'd just hurry up and tell me that my application has been denied, so I can stop getting hopeful.

FO: Skull Wristwarmers

A couple of hours on Saturday, plus a couple more today, and I have finished Naomi's wristwarmers!

The skull pattern is from Hello Yarn's Skull Socks of Fury. Basically I followed the pattern up until the chart was completed, then added approximately the same amount of stockinette and ribbing rows as the top side. This was my first time using DPNs, which are actually quite cool! I think I'm almost ready to tackle my first pair of socks.

These are for my good friend Naomi, who in addition to being the biggest POTC fanatic I know, is the one who taught me how to knit in January. She saw all the books I'd collected from various branch libraries, and one evening at work immediately proceeded to give me a demonstration using 2 pencils and some cotton string. That visual demonstration was the one thing I needed to get started.

I'm sure you can see the skulls are not quite identical. I lost a stitch near the bottom of the chart on the second wristwarmer, but I think it still looks okay. We can just say that one skull decomposed a little faster?

Finally, my new camera!

Well, the camera finally arrived last Tuesday, but this is the first chance I've been able to mention it. I love this camera, it may not be a digital SLR but it's a heck of an improvement over the 1.3 megapixel Cybershot I was using!
Here's one of the first pictures I took with it, at DH's cousin's graduation from Cal State Northridge:

I really don't remember it being that bright, but it's a great picture nonetheless.

And since this is first and foremost a knitting blog, I have to show some pictures of my WIPs...first the skull wristwarmers, which you can see I am slightly more than halfway done:

Secondly, the beginnings of a legwarmer for a coworker who is just about to graduate from high school. She does ballet, and when I was first starting to knit she'd asked if I could make her some legwarmers. I steal a half hour here and there at work (when she's not there) to work on them, and they are progressing nicely since it's just a simple 1x1 rib pattern. It's the legwarmer pattern from Last Minute Knitted Gifts.