PlanetJune Craft Blog

Latest news and updates from June

7th blogiversary

My 7th blogiversary couldn’t have come on a more appropriate day! Today my new visa application was submitted, which means I can begin to concentrate on PlanetJune again, and now is the perfect time to take stock and re-evaluate how things have been going and what my next steps should be.

Year 7 Review

This year has been all go, but since November my focus has been split by health problems, home problems (power outages, no internet service, water leak, being robbed) and immigration problems. These have consumed me for the past few months, but, hopefully, today is the turning point for all that 🙂

With all this clouding my mind, it’s hard to see what I’ve actually achieved with PlanetJune, so I’ve glanced back through my archives to remind myself. Surprisingly, despite everything, I managed to design and publish 24 new crochet patterns in Year 7 (exactly the same number as in Year 6):

PlanetJune year 7 crochet patterns

That makes me feel pretty good! And I have over a dozen more designs in progress, so the coming few months should see many more pattern releases 😀

I’ve also begun a project to reformat and re-publish all my older patterns, to add additional information and clarifications, and to save space and improve the layout. This requires concentration and meticulous checking to ensure I don’t introduce new errors into the new versions, so I’ve only been able to re-release 41 out of 124 patterns so far. It’s a huge project – I’m only 1/3 through it! – but I’m slowly working my way through the rest. It’s well worth doing though, so all my patterns will be standardised.

Goal Review

My Year 7 goal was to work on strategies to beat the overwhelming feeling of an ever-growing business with only one employee (me!) to do all the work:

I’m working on implementing [strategies] to make the ever-growing PlanetJune more sustainable with less work on my part: automating, prioritising, and re-energising.

Automating my business is still moving forward, albeit very slowly. Luckily my business growth has slowed to a more manageable level while I’ve been distracted, so I’m not completely overwhelmed, and the changes I’ve already made are keeping things in check.

Prioritising (and re-prioritising to account for unexpected incidents) has been critical in getting through the past months. My decisions are always based on keeping my standards high, which means I’ve been shifting due dates forward and planning for projects that I know I won’t even be able to begin until 2014! But there are no shortcuts to producing quality work: better to do it beautifully later than to produce something junky now.

Re-energising has obviously been a big fail over the past 6 months, but one I hope to make up for now – I’ll have more time to knit sweaters for relaxation and we’re planning some new wildlife-related adventures – yay!

What’s Next?

Now I should have more time again, so, once I’ve rested and got my health back, I want to get back up to speed and pick up all the PlanetJune projects I’ve had to abandon recently. Last year, I said:

Yes, I am slightly overworked right now because I’m in the midst of building all my new systems, but that won’t last forever and then I’ll have the payoff: being able to concentrate on the work I really enjoy: creating, innovating, and explaining crochet techniques. I can’t wait!

…and I still feel exactly the same way! I’ll get my new systems finished and the pattern updates completed, but I don’t want to set a time limit. I’ll work for as long as it takes to get everything finished without burning myself out in the process – I’ve had enough of being worn out!

After all the non-work-related stresses of the past few months, though, my work is going to feel like a holiday – I love PlanetJune and I’m very excited to get back to it 😀

To You…

I’ve made some wonderful friends through these past 7 years of craft blogging – some have been my compatriots from the very beginning, and others I’ve only connected with recently; some have become my treasured customers, and others support me with comments and emails. Our global online craft community is a very special environment and I’m grateful to be part of such a kind, generous group of people.

Thank you for accompanying me on my continuing PlanetJune adventure!

10 Comments »

  1. Elise said

    Congrats on your 7th blogiversary! I can’t wait to see what you come up with next. I’m a looong way until I have my own blogiversary as I started it in May of this year. But I only update it every few weeks or days it depends. No one reads it anyway, lol. Well some people probably read it but I haven’t ever gotten any comments yet.

  2. Amiguruthi said

    Congrats! I’m coming up to my first blogiversary in the next couple of weeks so seven seems like a million miles away.
    Love the patterns you’ve put out this year and can’t wait to see what comes next year 😀

  3. Saskia said

    Congratulations on your blog anniversary. I am looking forward to your next 8 years,with all the lovely designs. I hope things will be better and you will be feeling better soon.
    Thank you for letting me a part of your Planetjunea dventure

    Saskia

  4. Chrisie (CrochetChrisie) said

    Happy Blogiversary! It’s awesome to see a big collage of all of the past year’s patterns. You accomplished a lot!

    Two of my absolute favourite patterns (sea otter and Rottweiler) were done in the last year too. 😉

    Hopefully the next year isn’t as rocky, but we’ll be here to cheer you on no matter what.

  5. maria lucia cotruffo said

    Thank you for answering my comment.I do appreciate your work and mostly I was deeply touched when I read about you and your family.I wish I could have a friend like you here, in Brazil, close to me…I admire your personalily and I like the way you write. You are a good person to have as a friend and as a teacher. Although I am Brazilian and I speak Portuguese, I can speak English also but you have to forgive my mistakes when I write.
    I do hope you you take good care of yourself so you can share with us your beautiful work and go ahead with your business. Good luck to you and your beautiful family.

  6. jaleru mina said

    Very nice work! Go ahead and good luck!

  7. Congratulations on seven years. I’m glad to hear that things are on the upswing.

  8. Jazz said

    Congrats on the blogiversary!!

    Your designs are amazings!

  9. Caroline said

    Congratulations! And please look after yourself, late patterns are way, way better than no patterns. *hugs*

  10. Gillian McM said

    Congratulations, June, on your 7th Blogiversary. You have brought so many people so much pleasure. Speaking for myself, my work has improved constantly as I incorporate techniques you’ve invented, either through new patterns or with tutorials. I wish you a speedy recovery from your medical and domestic problems. You are clearly someone who drives herself hard, so there’s no point in saying, “Take is easy.” I’ll just say, “Be good to yourself,” I’m sure we all long for your new patterns, but which of us is not content to wait for them for as long as it takes? Hands up!… I see no hands …
    All the best to you!

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