Today’s PlanetJune Story is from Monica Ballinger of Greencastle, IN, whose work you’ll probably recognise if you follow my crochetalong roundups (and maybe more so if I mention her ravelry username, theMarkofSMB). Here’s a little sampling of some of Monica’s PlanetJune-designed creations:

How many PlanetJune designs can you spot? (The scarecrow is based on the ‘Boy’ pattern from my book!)

Monica writes:

I first learned about PlanetJune when I received The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Amigurumi as a gift. After reading it a couple times, I started my first amigurumi, the Hamster. The first one was a bit off, due to my own fault in miscounting (he’s much fatter than the others but still cute); however, the second one was much better! I made several for my children to play with and they loved them; they even ask me to make more whenever I get a new shade of brown yarn. Having June’s book has broadened my knowledge in amigurumi and crochet techniques that I use for any project I start. I am always going back thru her book to refresh my memory and find new ideas for specific items; it’s a great book to have for any crochet toy or project!

A few months later I started searching for dinosaur patterns because my children thought they didn’t have enough dinosaur toys. As I only crochet and don’t knit, I was starting to feel sad at not being able to find a crochet dinosaur pattern, but I finally found the perfect one, PlanetJune’s Stegosaurus. I bought all 6 patterns (at that time) and started working right away, and I fell in love with June’s patterns instantly! June’s clearly written, easy to follow instructions with detailed tips and pictures make her patterns worth every cent. June even offers assistance for any part of the pattern that may be confusing, by email or with her Ravelry group. The finished products turned out amazing; the dinosaurs were all so very realistic that I was HOOKED on PlanetJune. I plan to have all of June’s patterns one day, but at the moment my sons get to pick their favorites, which become my favorites as well! My three favorite patterns are Yeti/Bigfoot, Sea Turtle and Stegosaurus, but I love them all.

I’m an artist: drawings, photography, crafts, crochet accessories (hats, scarves, blankets) and amigurumi. I have participated in a few craft fairs over the years, and my husband suggested that I sell some of my amigurumi toys as well. After reading June’s policy on selling finished objects from her patterns, I fell in love with her work all over again: extremely wonderful patterns, beautiful finished items and I could sell them! I even made some business cards to attach to the toys giving June credit as the designer. While making a few extra amigurumi of June’s designs I opened up an Etsy shop, Magical Amigurumi, in the hopes of sharing the joy of the toys and making a little extra pattern funding 🙂

I enjoy crocheting because it’s relaxing and I love the joy it brings to children (including my own) when they get their new toy! I have even seen adults thrilled to have their very own toy (or collectible): I made a Realistic Pig for one of my uncles, as he and his daughters raise pigs for 4H, and he loved it so much; my other uncle received a Fruit Bat because he goes caving a lot and has been helping researchers with the white-nose syndrome that the bats have contracted; and I made a Bigfoot and added a bag for a wookie for my Father-in-law and it stands on his computer! I’ve made Apples and Tiny Whales for my son’s preschool class, and the teacher enjoyed receiving them as much as the children enjoyed playing with them.

Thank you June for designing such wonderful realistic amigurumi. They have brought a ton of joy to my house!

And thank you for sharing your story, Monica! I often wonder what happens to amigurumi that have been crocheted from my patterns, so it’s lovely to hear this story of patterns thoughtfully selected to be meaningful to each recipient, and to know the finished amigurumi are appreciated and treasured by their new owners. Monica has kindly shared photos of all the amigurumi she mentioned:


The first amigurumi Hamsters (from my book)

Yeti and Bigfoot (aka Wookie!)

Aren’t they all wonderful? Please leave Monica a comment if you’ve enjoyed this post, or visit Magical Amigurumi if you’re tempted to pick up an amigurumi for a special gift, or as a treat for yourself!

Do you have a PlanetJune Story you’d like to share? I’d love to hear it! Please email your story to june@planetjune.com, together with one or more high quality photos showing what you’ve made from PlanetJune patterns. If I choose your story to feature here on the blog, I’ll send you your choice of pattern from my shop to say thank you!

As I’m a 99% self-published designer, I don’t often get profiled in crochet magazines etc, so my Ravelry group decided to interview me to find out a little more about who I am and what I do – my own PlanetJune Story, if you like! I’ll be posting the answers to some of their questions every now and again, and grouping them by theme if they fit together nicely. Here are the first three:

How did you learn to crochet? (from Sandy G, via the blog)
Who taught you to crochet? (from Monica, theMarkofSMB)
What was the first thing you ever crocheted? (from Linda, Fatals-attraction)

In 2003, my husband and I moved from the UK to Canada, and I had time on my hands while I looked for a job. I’d always liked making things and I’d dabbled in various crafts in the past: polymer clay, cross stitch, candlemaking, sewing, and others. At the time, there was a big craft shop in the middle of Toronto (Lewiscraft – the chain closed years ago, sadly) and I spent a lot of time in there, looking for things to try out that wouldn’t cost much money. I tried teaching myself to knit, but didn’t really enjoy it. Then I picked up a crochet hook and a ‘learn to crochet’ book, and fell in love.

Did you notice I avoided the obvious “I was hooked!” pun there? I hope you’re proud of me!

(I’ve just remembered, this wasn’t actually my very first experience with crochet: my aunt apparently taught me the basics when I was tiny, but I don’t remember that at all, although I do still have my old hook – I always wondered why I had a crochet hook in my childhood sewing box!)

I’ve never been much of a pattern follower – I like to make up my own things (a precursor of things to come…). I also don’t like to start with really basic projects. So I decided I’d learn as I go by making an afghan to use against the cold Canadian winter, using squares of single crochet, and that’s what I did.

Here’s the thing: I didn’t really know how to crochet at the time, and this was an ambitiously large project for a total beginner! I made that basic rookie mistake of thinking you should insert your hook into the back loop (instead of both) to begin each single crochet stitch. I’d never heard of gauge, or blocking. I slip stitched my pile of squares together, but sadly didn’t know about leaving a long tail to weave in securely when you finish off, so my poor yarn tails are only about an inch long. I’d also never heard of edging, which would have given my afghan a nicer finish…

My first afghan (made in 2003-2004, photo from 2006). One of these squares is the first thing I ever crocheted!

It’s not perfect, but that’s okay. I still use it all the time; I keep it draped over a folding chair in my office so I can sit comfortably when I’m making videos and tutorials. The BLO single crochet doesn’t look like a mistake, unless you know it’s not what I intended! And I love being able to see the first thing I ever crocheted and know how far I’ve come.

After that, I decided to learn all the crochet stitches by making a sampler afghan – and yes, I did need a pattern for that! I used the 63 Easy-to-Crochet Pattern Stitches booklet (highly recommended if you’d like to crochet a stunning heirloom afghan, or to practice a large variety of crochet techniques and stitches).

Puzzling through the instructions for the trickier squares was what made me finally realise my mistake with the back loops, and ending up with squares of vastly different sizes is how I learnt about the importance of gauge. It took almost 3 years, but I finished it (with a sneaky extra round of sc around the edges of the tinier squares to even the sizes up a bit!) and it looks pretty impressive, even if it’s not quite perfect:

My second afghan (started Feb 2004, finished Nov 2006, photo from 2006)

The moral of the story is that, clearly, nobody starts out as an expert! These two afghans show my crochet learning experience in every stitch, and I love them both for that. It was a self-taught struggle – especially with no Ravelry or YouTube videos to consult as you can now – but, by the time I’d finished the sampler afghan, I really understood crochet. I could have made a 2nd, perfect, sampler afghan, but it was time for me to try something different…

I think this post is long enough now – I’ll save the story of how I got into amigurumi, and the rest of the interview questions, for another day. 😉

I hope you’ve enjoyed hearing a bit about my crochet background. If you have any questions you’d like to add to the interview pool, please submit them on Ravelry or in the comments of this post – I’ll do another interview post in a little while!

Today’s PlanetJune Story is from Rita Elenius from Finland. I’ve heard from several people who’ve used my Basic Rose pattern to crochet the flowers for their wedding bouquets and boutonnieres, but Rita chose something a little less traditional for her own wedding…

Rita writes:

I just wanted to send a small thank you for the mop top mascot pattern you have made and shared with us all. In Finland we don’t yet have that much of amigurumi-culture, so your patterns are a great source of ideas! I first found your lemmings pattern a year ago through a friend, and was ever so delighted, having played the Lemmings-game for hours and hours when I was little.

My wedding was on its way, and we had been trying to think of something to give as wedding favors. When I made a set of Lemmings (pictured above) as a birthday present for my stepfather, the idea of a bunch of little people with all the colors of the rainbow started to grow, and soon I announced to my groom that I would make 80 little mascots for our wedding. At first he was a bit doubtful because of all the work and time it would take, but also excited because he loved the little guys as well.

In the end, the last little person was finished at 6:00 in the morning on the eve of our wedding, after a night of laboring not only by me, but also by my two sisters and my groom. 😀

But it paid off, since the guys were a HUGE hit! Everybody loved them, children played with them, not one was left behind when the night was over. Many of the men put theirs in the breast pocket of their suits, which lifted the spirit even higher!

So, thank you again for your wonderful work and help to us, who want to do, but don’t know what or how. 😀

I’m so happy that my design could play a small part in Rita’s special day! Imagine the dedication she needed to get 80+ mop-tops finished in time for the big day, at the same time as managing all the other wedding preparations! Rita kindly shared a few of her stunning wedding photos (below) and you can clearly see that it was worth all the effort:

Isn’t that just wonderful?! Thank you, Rita, for sharing your story and beautiful photos with us.

(By the way, if you haven’t seen my Mop Top Mascots pattern, you might want to take a look – it’s a perennial favourite among my donationware designs.)

Do you have a PlanetJune Story you’d like to share? I’d love to hear it! Please email your story to june@planetjune.com, together with one or more high quality photos showing what you’ve made from PlanetJune patterns. If I choose your story to feature here on the blog, I’ll send you your choice of pattern from my shop to say thank you!

After a long break, it’s time to resurrect my PlanetJune Stories series, and hear from more of my wonderful customers. Today’s story is from Judy Carlson of Boulder, CO, who is one of a handful of people who has bought pretty much everything I’ve ever published! So let’s find out what she does with all those PlanetJune amigurumi patterns…

Here’s a little sampling of what Judy has made with my patterns… impressive, huh? How many do you recognise?! Read Judy’s story, and then I’ll show more of her photos at the end of the post!

Judy writes:

The first PlanetJune pattern that I ever used was her Basic Rose pattern. I crocheted a cake and wanted some roses for decoration and they were perfect!

Then I did a PlanetJune crochet-along project or two, but what really got me hooked on her patterns were her Cactus Collections: they are SO real looking and awesome! After that I have been NUTS for June’s patterns and now have almost all of them and have completed the majority of the patterns I own.

In addition to having really great patterns with easy to follow instructions and new techniques that result in nice crisp finished products with clean lines and incredible cuteness, she allows people to sell finished items as long as they credit her as the designer. Knowing this, in January 2011, I opened my Etsy shop, Judy’s Ami Shop.

Currently, everything I have in stock is made from PlanetJune patterns. I am having so much fun with my shop! I love getting orders, boxing them up, and taking them to the post office. I have had a husband order a Chinchilla for an anniversary gift for his wife, an Alpaca ordered for a wedding gift, and recently I got an order for a Guinea Pig to be a companion to a real Guinea Pig whose brother died. (My customer reports that her Guinea Pig likes his new crocheted buddy!) The furthest away that I’ve gotten an order is from Japan – where my fuzzy Red Fox now lives.

All the money I have made from my store has gone into buying new PlanetJune patterns, yarn, and supplies. I can only expect that my Etsy shop will continue to grow! But I don’t put everything I crochet up for sale; some go to friends and family for gifts. And sometimes I am tempted to close my shop, surround myself with all of the amis and say, “mine all mine!”, as I laugh maniacally! After crocheting the Aardvark pattern, I decided that this Aardvark was my Aardvark – I love him so. I look forward to seeing June’s pattern store continue to grow and see what she comes up with next!

I hope most of my customers realise by now that you, like Judy, are allowed to sell as many items as you want, made from my patterns, provided you credit me as the designer and don’t share the patterns themselves!

(I’ll blog in more detail about this later, but if you have an online shop where you sell items you’ve made from my patterns, you might like to add your shop details to my list of PlanetJune-designed toy sellers. I refer anyone who enquires about finished items to this list, so it’s a great way to get a little free promotion for your shop!)

And now let’s look at a few more of Judy’s crocheted creations:

Cactus Collection

Poison Dart Frog; Lion and Lioness

Thank you so much, Judy, for sharing your story and lovely photos with us! Please leave Judy a comment if you’ve enjoyed this post, or visit Judy’s Ami Shop if you’d like to buy one of her lovely (and familiar-looking!) creations.

Do you have a PlanetJune Story you’d like to share? I’d love to hear it! Please email your story to june@planetjune.com, together with one or more high quality photos showing what you’ve made from PlanetJune patterns. If I choose your story to feature here on the blog, I’ll send you your choice of pattern from my shop to say thank you!

Today’s PlanetJune Story is from Melissa Frelo of Aurora, IL, and it’s a case of perfect timing: it’s a guinea pig story, and I also have a guinea pig photo to share with you today. We found a wonderful Wildlife Sanctuary in Hout Bay called World of Birds. I joined as a member so I can go back often – it’s the largest bird park in Africa so it’ll be a while before I’ve explored all the amazing free-flying walk-through cages and aviaries. They rescue animals as well as birds, and for some reason (abandoned pets, maybe?) they have a huge cage full of guinea pigs:

Guinea pigs galore!

Unexpected, but very cute! The guinea pigs all seemed very contented, running free in their giant outdoor area and then going back inside for food and water – I think they have a good life there.

And now a segue from real guinea pigs to crocheted guinea pigs!
Melissa writes:

I just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed making the fuzzy guinea pigs. I ordered the pattern from your website and made the piggies for my childrens’ Easter baskets. Although I have experience crocheting, this was my first attempt at amigurumi. Your instructions were very detailed and easy to follow and the results were great. I attached a few photos of the real piggies and their crocheted friends. Thanks for the wonderful pattern!

And thank you, Melissa, for sharing your story with us. Here are Melissa’s guinea pigs, Roxie and Gracie, and their crocheted counterparts – it’s hard to tell which are real and which are crocheted!

Melissa did a great job with matching the markings to her piggies’ markings.

Just look at those sweet guinea piggy faces – so adorable! My guinea pig pattern has been a bestseller for years now, but if you haven’t jumped on the guinea pig train yet, you can get on board and pick up the pattern in my shop 🙂

Do you have a PlanetJune Story you’d like to share? I’d love to hear it! Please email your story to june@planetjune.com, together with one or more high quality photos showing what you’ve made from PlanetJune patterns. If I choose your story to feature here on the blog, I’ll send you your choice of pattern from my shop to say thank you!

Today’s PlanetJune Story is from Jeff McClelland. Jeff is the author of the comic book series Teddy and the Yeti, and he contacted me about a year ago to ask about a special pattern commission…

Jeff writes:

The worlds of comic books and amigurumi crochet probably don’t come together very often, but after discovering PlanetJune.com, I knew it was time for an old fashioned team up.

I write the comic Teddy and the Yeti and knew, as convention season crept up on me, that I’d want to take some material to shows beyond just the comics themselves – something that could catch someone’s eye as they walked by my booth. June’s patterns were just what I was looking for in terms of their unique, adorable appeal, so I contacted her about creating a new pattern based on the Yeti character from my book.

The final result was a pattern that was easy to crochet and cuter than I could have hoped for – the pictures don’t do the real thing justice. Now I have a Yeti doll – an official Yeti doll at that! – that brings people to my table at conventions; I’ve even had the pleasant experience of someone who might not be interested in comics liking the doll so much that he or she picks up the book as well.

Comic books are collaborative in nature: each creator brings along a different skill that results in a distinct final product. I like to think that the work I did in Teddy and the Yeti influenced PlanetJune’s Yeti crochet pattern ever so slightly to create a similar effect.

Thanks for sharing your story, Jeff. Your commission was an interesting challenge – definitely a departure from my usual subject matter, but I think we nailed it! For our collaboration I used colours inspired by the comic book yeti and added some of my trademark cuteness to the design.

Fellow geeks, you’ll love these pics Jeff sent from the 2010 New York Comic-Con:

Yeti takes over Comic-Con…

I know a Jayne hat when I see one, Jeff – very nice!


Yeti meets Thundercats’ Lion-O!

Story links:

• I’ll start accepting pattern commissions again when I’m settled in South Africa – email me if you’re interested in commissioning me.
• If you’d like to make a Yeti of your own, check out my Yeti and Bigfoot crochet pattern.
• You can order Teddy and the Yeti comic books through any comic store or online at Mile High Comics.

Do you have a PlanetJune Story you’d like to share? I’d love to hear it! Please email your story to june@planetjune.com, together with one or more high quality photos showing what you’ve made from PlanetJune patterns. If I choose your story to feature here on the blog, I’ll send you your choice of pattern from my shop to say thank you!

Today’s PlanetJune Story is from Heather Hoover of Grove City, OH, who turned her love of crocheting into a business called The Yarnyard, by selling her impressive collection of amigurumi at craft shows. Please note: Heather’s kind words are all her own! I blushed when I read them – but not as much as I smiled when I saw this photo of her table at the craft show, laden with so many familiar designs:

I know – there are too many to make out! Check out the close-ups below once you’ve read Heather’s story….

Heather writes:

After about a year of making Amigurumi for my children, I considered the idea of making them to sell at a local craft show. I didn’t want to use just any kind of free pattern available. I wanted good quality patterns that looked both realistic and cute. I also needed to find a designer that would be willing to allow the crafted product to be sold. I quickly began losing hope in my newfound dream because so many designers would not allow selling of the finished products. I was angry! It wasn’t like I wanted to steal designs or take credit for them. I simply wanted to enjoy the hobby of crafting Amigurumi and make a little extra cash at the same time.

I kept searching and finally happened upon PlanetJune.com. As I looked through the patterns, I felt completely in awe at the design quality, the realistic look of the animals, and the cuteness encompassing them. I didn’t want to get too excited because I felt certain I would run into the same issue of selling the product. I hesitantly searched around the site for the ‘fine print’. Much to my delight, I saw “You may sell items made from my patterns, provided you comply with [my terms]”. Of course, I was happy to follow these terms. A rush of joy burst through me, and I realized I had found my perfect source.

When I bought my first few patterns from June, I expected them to be on the difficult side. I was pleasantly surprised by the easy to follow step-by-step instructions and pictures she included. I started out simple, but could hardly wait to try my hand at the textured yarns that many of June’s high-quality designs suggest. June doesn’t miss a step in her instructions. They are very easy to understand. If you do run into a problem, she offers help through email communication and has posted many of her techniques on PlanetJune.com.

After a year of buying patterns and crafting June’s designs, I had enough product to sell at the craft show. I communicated my plan with June and she gladly sent me a stack of her business cards to share with fellow crafters. I named my business The Yarnyard; created cards, and made it official. The show was a great success. I sold more than half my items and inspired many crafters to pick up their old crochet hooks. I referred them to PlanetJune with the hope that more people can enjoy the art of crochet and all that June has to offer.

I appreciate June’s willingness to share and her dedication to us, as crafters. I believe this is the way it should be in our world of artistic expression. Life is much more fun when we can work together, and that’s exactly what June and I did. I helped boost her business by getting her name out there and she made it possible for me to enjoy my hobby and earn cash at the same time.

Thanks so much, Heather, for sharing your story! Unlike many designers, I’m always happy to allow people to sell the products that they make from my patterns, provided they give me credit as the designer, and never share the pattern with anyone else! The way I see it, if you’ve put the work into making an amigurumi, you deserve to make whatever you can from it. You can buy another pattern from me if you make some money from selling and want to thank me – that way we’ll both benefit!

And now let’s take a better look at some of Heather’s craft show table:

Lots of characters I recognise! Among others, I spot AmiDogs, Dinosaurs, Fuzzy Monkey, Foxes…

Farmyard Pigs, Poison Dart Frog, Mini Fuzzies Hedgehog, Gecko…

Sea Turtle, Fruit Bat, Fuzzy Bears & Seal…

I think this is my favourite pic though – just look at all these Mop Top Mascots! I love the way Heather has displayed them, don’t you?

Do you have a PlanetJune Story you’d like to share? I’d love to hear it! Please email your story to june@planetjune.com, together with one or more high quality photos showing what you’ve made from PlanetJune patterns. If I choose your story to feature here on the blog, I’ll send you your choice of pattern from my shop to say thank you!

After people buy my patterns, that’s often the end of my involvement with them – I rarely get to see the end results, or what people do with their creations after they’ve made with them. With PlanetJune Stories, I hope to change all that! I want to discover and share how amazing my customers are with this new series of posts, each featuring one of my customers and his/her personal story.

My first PlanetJune Story features Sandy Grabowski of Cincinnati, OH, and the heartwarming tale of how she came to crochet this impressive AmiDogs collection:

Sandy writes:

I have crocheted for many years. When my son was young, I started making creatures using the wonderful patterns that were available then from Annie’s Attic, when Annie had first started up her business. He would go through the patterns as I was making one and say, ‘Make this one next, Mom!’ As he grew up I turned to other projects, huge afghans and such, but a few years ago I wanted to go back to making creatures. It’s such fun to take a single strand of yarn and a simple hook and end up with an almost-living being with a personality. But what to do with them when I was done?

The solution was that I offered them to the Ronald McDonald House here in Cincinnati (there are many of them across this country and throughout the world). The dedicated staff there provides a home-like place to stay for the families of children who are undergoing treatment at Children’s Hospital. Each child who comes gets a basket of goodies, and often one of my creatures is in it. It gives me a warm feeling as I work to know that my creatures may bring a smile to a a child in a difficult situation and perhaps become a lifetime companion.

In my never-ending search for patterns, I discovered PlanetJune and purchased all the AmiDogs patterns (and many others), and recently I decided that for my next shipment, I would crochet all of them at once. This marvelous group portrait is the result. I embroidered the eyes for safety reasons and gave each one a colorful collar and a smile. June Gilbank is an artist in not only creating such wonderful, true-to-life creatures, but in making it possible for anyone to make them through her lovely patterns and her most excellent and useful book (which shows how you can design your own!). The staff at the Ronald McDonald House is always amazed at the versatility of what can be done with crochet. Thanks so very much, June, and all the best to you in your big South African adventure!!!

And thank you, Sandy, for sharing your story with us! Here are Sandy’s dogs in close-up:

Aren’t they lovely?! So full of personality! I’m sure Sandy’s dogs have brightened the days of a lot of children at Ronald McDonald House.

Do you have a PlanetJune Story you’d like to share? I’d love to hear it! Please email your story to june@planetjune.com, together with one or more high quality photos showing what you’ve made from PlanetJune patterns. If I choose your story to feature here on the blog, I’ll send you a free pattern to say thank you!