After taking several placement test, asking several favors from professors and enrolling in a last minute Critical Thinking class over the summer, I'm finally a Junior chemistry major at CSUN (California State University: Northridge).  I'll likely be there for more than two years, but I should finish my degree here.  I really hope so anyway.

The university mascot is the Matador, hence the title.  Our mascot's name is Matty.

Since I'm on a sort of schedule now, I'm going to try to regularly update.  I'd like to try and post Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, but that all depends on how busy I get.  I only have two classes this semester, but they are five credits each and I expect them to demand a lot of my time.

Today wasn't so bad though.  First days of a class usually aren't; most of the time is spent on the professor's policies.  I'm trying to get a head start by reading about limits for tomorrow.

Surprise!  We now live in Southern California; the Santa Clarita Valley to be exact.  I love it here so far, except that there are NO knitting shops anywhere.  They've all shut down over the past few years.  The closest one is about half an hour south

Then again, we're not dealing with the snow like Illinois and my home state of Maryland is.  A small price to pay depending on who you ask.

While I'm waiting to be accepted at CSUN, I've been using the free time to catch up on projects and getting re-acquainted with my wheel.  The really neat thing about living in our new place is, I get my own crafting table and space!  I'm working on getting an entire bedroom to myself, but for now the extra space is awesome.  I can leave my sewing machine out...yes I got a sewing machine.

I now own a Bernina Activa 220 and I've already made a small quilt with it.

I pieced it together and sent it away to be quilted.  This turned into a Christmas gift for my parents.

The Paintbox Hat way back in August was frogged because it was too big for Jake.  Instead, he got this.

I call it the Sunset hat, which is really the Pismo Hat.  Jake dyed this yarn back at the Midwest Fiber and Folk Art Festival.  He's not into socks, so I decided on this instead.  It's obviously a bit big for me, but it's a nice skullcap for Jake that doesn't keep him too warm.  We're in California now after all.  It's February and sixty degrees out as I write.

The decreases for the top make the hat a bit pointy, but it smooshes out when Jake wears it.

This is for a friend.

It is 50% complete, has cables, and is made with superwash.   That is all I will say about this...for now.

I also spun up some yarn that didn't fall apart...for the first time!

It's about 80 yards of 3-ply.  The white singles are wool and the green is alpaca.  I don't know how many stitches per inch I can get with it, but I'm determined to turn this into something.

I hope it holds up

Lastly, I've started my own Noro striped sock.  Jake picked out the colors.

This is a fun knit to watch because the colors gradually change.  I'll keep the cuff, heel, and toe as one yarn.  It's a little itchy to work with, but I'm certain it'll soften up a bit in the wash.

For those of you out in all of the snow, stay safe!

YARN STORAGE

I've decided to act on my opinion that sock yarn is too pretty to keep in bins and made a trip to Target.  I got some Itso cubes and rearranged my stash.

The bottom two cubes hold non-sock yarn, needles, notions, and some knitting related books.  I'm hoping I don't regret leaving the yarn out in the open like this, but it's so much better than having them stuffed in bins in the closet.

I also got some shoe cubbies to organize our shoes instead of just throwing them in the closet.  It was a mess...

SHOES?!

I went to a local shoe store that sells brands like Keen and Dansko to look for that perfect mary jane shoe to wear with my hand knit socks.  I didn't get anything because the saleslady told me their fall inventory will be on sale in a couple of weeks.  If I wait, I'll have a bigger selection.  I don't have a problem with that.  I wore socks made with different yarns to test drive the shoes.

I think I should just do this more often anyway because it's fun.  No pressure on getting that second sock finished.

I frogged the Kristi socks.  The Acero splits too much for a project like Kristi, which is loaded with small cables.  I tried to persevere through it, but a few days ago I realized I haven't knit anything for two weeks.  Frogging the Kristi socks immediately fixed the problem.

Here is a progress photo of the 'Sekrit Project'.  The Ella Rae Superwash and soft and the project itself is almost mindless.  There are a few cables thrown in to keep it interesting.

I sort of hard an epiphany after frogging the Kristi socks.  I have a lot of variegated sock yarn.  A lot...  In fact, I should probably sell some (No, that wasn't my epiphany).  I don't want to sell any of it; a lot of it I picked out with Jake and I remember how almost each skein was purchased.  Picking out a perfect pattern for my sock yarn, especially when its variegated, is frustrating me.  I'm tired of trying.

I'll just knit plain vanilla socks.  No worrying about the pattern being lost in the coor and I don't care so much about pooling or identical socks.

I recently purchased some Creatively Dyed Calypso yarn from The Loopy Ewe.  I picked up the Promise colorway from the Calypso line.  I'm going straight to her booth at the Midwest Fiber Fair; I love her colors and she's really nice.  I started a Yarn Harlot plain vanilla sock and am enjoying knitting again.

The truth is that I had to frog my first attempt and start over again.  I was getting 9 stitches per inch instead of the 7.5 suggested on the ball band.  I had to add an extra tweleve stitches to cast on in order to compensate.

Is anyone else going to the Midwest Fiber Fair?

So after knitting those 36 rows I totally missed in the instructions, the back of my Rogue pullover is now even with the front and I could bind off the shoulders together.

I even tried it on and it fits fine so far.  I'm very pleased with my work on this.  I'm still terrified of seaming it all up later.  

This is why an upcoming project will be the V-Neck Man's Pullover from Knitting Pure and Simple.  No seaming!  Jake picked out some Rustic Wool for the project and it's really soft.  I'm in the process of swatching it now.

No, this nothing to do with my Sekrit Project.  That project still remain sekrit.

I have cast on for the May Sockdown project.

When I'm done, my sock should look just like the one on the cover of Sock Innovations.  A sock pattern that shares the same name as me AND has cables.  I couldn't resist signing up for the sockdown.  I'm also glad I learned to read charts early in my knitting career.

The semester is winding down; one more week of class and then finals.  I will be taking Intro to Plant Biology this summer so I can keep my student employment.  I want to get my biology out of the way anyway.  I don't have too much of an issue with dissecting plants.