Note: don’t forget to enter my contest at the end of this post!

Year in Review

Doesn’t time fly? I can’t believe I’ve been running this blog for 2 years! Looking back to last year’s blogiversary post, I see that I’ve added 19 more original designs to my crochet pattern store, plus I created 4 more free patterns.

This year’s tutorials included lots of Amigurumi Help, the Offset Square Wrist Pincushion and the amazingly popular Shrinkydinks Rings tutorial. If you’ve made anything from my tutorials, don’t forget to upload the pics to my new Flickr group, PlanetJune Tutorial Gallery – I’d love to see what you’ve made!

I tried some new crafts: felt toys, modular origami and needlefelting – all of which I hope to do more of in the future.

This year, PlanetJune also appeared in print for the first time:

• A pattern in the 2008 Crochet Pattern a Day calendar, and featured on the back cover of the box
• My Joining Amigurumi article in CROQ Zine
• A full page of photos of my designs in the design gallery section of Amigurumi Animals
• My ice cream bear pattern and a companion article I wrote in A Needle Pulling Thread magazine (Summer 2008 issue – should be out any day now, and I can’t wait to see it!)

And, on top of all that, we moved to a new city and bought our first house, which resulted in me driving back to my old job every day for 6 months (that’s almost 4 hours per day in the car) over a very long and snowy winter – I can’t remember how I even managed to get anything else done…

What’s Next?

It came as quite a shock to see how much crochet I’ve done this year, compared with other crafting. I suppose I’ve been concentrating so much on making patterns, everything else has come second. For the coming year, I’m hoping I’ll find more time to make more things, without neglecting my pattern designing either. It’s exhilarating to try new things, so I want to keep pushing myself out of my comfort zone.

I also have some new and exciting things in development, but they aren’t quite ready to share just yet…

Roll on year 3! I can’t wait to see what comes next in the PlanetJune story…

Thank you!

Of course the best part of all this is still getting to ‘meet’ so many wonderful people! I was going to namecheck some of my bestest online friends, but I don’t want to leave anyone out, so… well, I’m talking about YOU. Thank you for reading this, thank you for your comments and e-mails, thank you for buying my patterns.

Contest Time!

Now your reward for reading this far: it’s contest time! I’m running 2 contests this time:

1. Win any pattern (your choice) from the pattern store. FYI, each PocketAmi set counts as one pattern 🙂
2. Win a finished PocketAmi Mouse (shipped to you, anywhere in the world). I have crocheted an adorable little grey mouse especially for this contest… This is a rare opportunity to get your hands on a PlanetJune original!
   
   I have small hands – he is even smaller than he looks here!

To enter, leave me a comment on this post, including:

1. Your choice of prize – type MOUSE or PATTERN
2. Tell me something, e.g. your favourite thing I’ve made, a suggestion for a future design, something you’d like to see on PlanetJune. Anything goes – I just want to hear from you!

If you want to enter both contests, just leave me 2 comments!

On Friday 20th June at 5pm EST, I will draw one name from each set of MOUSE comments, and one from each set of PATTERN comments. (In the unlikely event that the same person ‘wins’ both, I will contact them to see which prize they would prefer, and then draw another name for the other contest winner). Good luck!