PlanetJune Blog: Latest News, Patterns and Tutorials

PlanetJune Commissions has been revamped to be easier, faster and more fun. The basic premise hasn’t changed – you can help to choose and crowdfund new PlanetJune crochet pattern designs by ‘voting’ with your commission pledge!

But I’ve reworked the mechanisms to make it more fun for you from now on, and so you won’t be stuck with pledges you made forever ago.

A Little Background…

It’s coming up for 5 years since I first launched my crowdfunded commissions system as a barometer of public opinion on which potential animal designs may be most popular. Every animal on the commissions list is one I feel confident I’d be able to design, and happy to do so if enough people show an interest. I don’t have time to design them all, and using the commissions system as a gauge to which may be popular is a useful method to decide between multiple designs I’d be equally happy to create.

After a few hurdles (I set the prices far too low, so too many designs were being pledged for me to keep up with!), I temporarily withdrew the commissions system while I completed all the fully-pledged designs and worked on upgrading the system to make it more sustainable.

Thanks to my supporters, I’ve now completed 17 crowdsourced commissioned designs – and I’m ready to start on the 18th! Which animal will it be..?

How It Works

Commissions are now linked to your PlanetJune account. Once you’ve logged in, you’ll find the new commissions options in ‘My Account’, and from there you can make pledges, view your existing pledges, and upgrade, downgrade or delete your pledges.

Now you can pledge any full dollar amount (although there’s still a $6 minimum) so you can pledge $7, or $10, or $25 – or whatever you want!

Your pledge indicates your intention to pay that amount towards the commission of the design in question, should that design become fully-funded. But, your pledge will only become locked-in at such time as the design is a) fully pledged and b) at the top of the queue.

This means you won’t be stuck with a pledge you made months or years ago – you can log into your PlanetJune account and change or delete any unlocked pledges at any time until the next commission is ready to begin (at which time all pledges towards the next fully-pledged design will be locked).

This gives you the freedom to pledge as much as you like towards as many designs as you like. At most, you’ll be committing to one of your pledges, as only the first fully-funded design will get locked and made. Even if there are other fully-funded commissions, no further pledges will be locked-in until I’ve completed the previous design, published the pattern, and announced the date of the next commissions slot – you can still delete those pledges if you change your mind.

So you’re only ever committed to your pledge for the current commission. Let’s say you want to pay $30 for any one of 3 designs (but not for all of them!), you can pledge $30 towards each of them in the hope that one will grab the next commission slot. Once that happens, you’re free to delete your remaining pledges if you want, so you won’t get a surprise $30 invoice several months (or even years) later.

In this way, we can have a ‘bidding war’ every time I have a commission slot available. I’ll announce the slot via the Commissions newsletter, you make your best pledge for all the designs you’d like to commission, and whichever hits the jackpot first will become my next commissioned pattern!

Then, after the bidding war is over, you’ll have at least a month to decide if you’re still happy to honour all your other pledges, as no other design will be locked-in until I’ve completed the current pattern and announced the date of the next commission slot. Edit or delete your pledges from your PlanetJune account as often as you want – it’s all automatic.

Design Options

To give you a better idea of what I plan to design with each option, I’ve added a representative photo of each of the animals, either from my own photos, or licenced through Creative Commons.

The photos above are just a sample – you can see them all on the Design Options page on the new Commissions microsite.

Note: I had planned to add some new options to the commissions list at this relaunch time, but the list is plenty long enough already, so I’m keeping the options as-is for the time being. Once we’re well into the first cycle, I’ll get rid of some of the least popular choices and replace them with new requests. So please:

Stay Updated

I highly recommend you sign up for my Commissions News mailing list to be notified whenever new design options are added. I’ll also be emailing the list with a reminder a couple of weeks before I open each new commissions slot, so you’ll have an extra chance to check all your pledges and delete any you’re unhappy with – or add some new ones – before the next commission gets locked in.

Pledge Now for the February Timeslot!

Make your best pledges right now for the animals you’d most like me to design. At the time I write this, Goat is in the lead, with Raccoon and Capybara coming up fast and a whole host of others closing in – but that could all change in an instant… Make your best pledges now for your favourites, and maybe your design will be the one I start in the next month!

Ready to pledge? Login to your PlanetJune account – you’ll see the Commissions options (to make/edit your pledges) in ‘My Account’.

Or check out the design options and FAQ on the Commissions microsite.

I hope the new and improved PlanetJune Commissions will lead to lots more lovely animal designs to add to my portfolio – I’m looking forward to seeing which I’ll get to make first!

It’s easy when you’re immersed in a business every day to jump straight into the next thing, keep tightly focused on the next task, and not really see how far you’ve come. This Year in Review post is the one time I actually stop and think about what I’ve accomplished over the past year…

In 2016, I released 14 new crochet patterns, adding a varied mix of animals, plants, accessories, donationware and seasonal designs to my catalogue:

I haven’t had a lot of time for non-work crafting, but I have knitted another 1.5 sweaters (although I’ve just realised I haven’t even photographed/blogged my last 2015 sweater yet – oops!) and made a few other things, including my polymer clay BB-8 🙂

Personal Report

From May-August, I spent 1-2 weeks of each month travelling (to the UK, Hawaii, a Kruger safari, and Canada), which was far too much, but I either take the opportunity to travel with Dave when he has observing trips and conferences, or we miss out on the chance of a short holiday at an exciting location for little more than the cost of my plane tickets.

But, especially as we decided (for safety reasons) to not announce when we weren’t going to be home, that put a lot of business stress on me. How can I stay active on my blog and social media when all I’m doing is visiting places I can’t mention or struggling to catch up and get the next pattern ready before the next trip?

It was exhausting, and it took its toll with another 2-month bronchitis episode, which forced a lapse in my knee rehab exercises, so now I have knee problems again… I know I did too much, and I’ve learnt my lesson.

But, although I’d like to travel less frequently in future, I don’t regret my choices: we had some spectacular travel adventures with memories I’ll always treasure, I got over the bronchitis, and I know I can get my knee back to its still-wobbly-but-not-painful best in time. And I have an amazing amount of new wildlife inspiration:

Clockwise from top left: I photographed a UK robin, Hawaiian turtle, Canadian chipmunk, and African elephant – all in one year!

Business Report

My most popular patterns in 2016 were my turtles, cacti/succulents, and AmiCats (all pictured below), followed by the new 2016 releases.

It’s always the case that a few bestselling patterns make up the majority of my sales, but the size and variety of my catalogue as a whole is equally important – looking at my sales statistics, I can see that I wouldn’t be able to make a good living from my patterns without having both a) a handful of very popular designs and b) many dozens of other choices.

For the past five years, I’ve kept an annual list of large project goals for PlanetJune, to complete as time permits. In 2016, I completed the last of these large behind-the-scenes projects to improve the running of my business:

• Upgrading and relaunching my shop with new features
• Splitting my FAQ into its own microsite with each answer on its own page
• Adding closed captioning to all my YouTube video tutorials
• Relaunching my newsletter with a new branded look and better anti-spam protection
• Developing and coding an improved pattern commissions system (to be relaunched later this month – watch this space!)

What’s Next?

It’s exciting to have completed all my big projects – I usually spend a large fraction of each year working behind the scenes on tech updates and improvements. But patterns and tutorials are big projects in themselves, and there’ll always be new tech/security updates to implement, so I’m happy to start 2017 without any additional goals. If I leave myself with more time to play around with new design concepts, who knows what I’ll come up with..?

My wish for 2017 is for creative freedom, light-heartedness, and time to relax. I think PlanetJune will benefit from that too, and I hope you’ll also be able to find those things in the year ahead. Happy New Year!

If you’re a long-time reader, you may remember the R2-D2 sculpture I completed in 2009. Ever since I saw The Force Awakens, I’ve been wanting to make my R2 a little BB-8 buddy. I bought the polymer clay in May (it turns out FIMO Soft is available in the perfect orange colour – very convenient), and I’ve been waiting to find some sculpting time ever since. And here’s the result:

This was not an easy project. It didn’t occur to me at first how much more difficult BB-8 would be to make than R2-D2. The detailing I did on R2 was incredibly small, and, as BB-8 is only two-thirds the size of R2, that means all the detail is even smaller.

And then there’s the real problem: circles. (Yes, this should have been obvious from the start…) BB-8 is a ball, where R2 is a cylinder, and all the details are based on circles, whereas R2’s are based on rectangles. Freehanding circles is hard. Freehanding rings is even harder. And then try shrinking all those rings down to fit on a ball that’s only 4cm (1.5″) tall..!

So yes, the circles aren’t perfect, and I had to leave out the finest level of detailing. But it’s part of the joy of a handsculpt that it’s clearly handmade – if I wanted exact perfection, I could have just bought a model BB-8 from a toy shop, but where’s the fun in that?

And now for your reward for reading this whole post: BB-8 and R2-D2 both have hidden magnets embedded within them that allow their heads to rotate! Just watch this:

See my R2-D2 post to see how I achieved this!

It’s such a pleasure to make things just for the fun and challenge of the making. R2-D2 is very pleased with his little brother, and so am I 🙂

I’ve started a new hobby: setting up themed photos that cram in lots of my crochet designs for my Instagram account. It takes a while to set them up, but I’m really enjoying the results! Here’s my latest one, featuring over a dozen of my Christmas designs:

A plethora of seasonal PlanetJune designs – find all the patterns here

I’m planning to make more of these crochet scenes next year – follow me on Instagram (@PlanetJune) if you’d like to see them 🙂

And, if you’re crocheting Christmas decorations or presents, please join the Christmas CAL in the PlanetJune Ravelry group and share what you’re making from my seasonal patterns (or any other PJ patterns as Christmas gifts).

Review and Win contest

You’re automatically entered in the next monthly draw every time you write a review for a PlanetJune pattern you’ve enjoyed – and you’ll also be helping future customers make an informed decision about patterns they are considering buying.

October’s winning review is Holly M‘s review of my Koala pattern:

I chose this pattern for a group project in which my office-mates and I all made a bunch of koalas and attached them to the trees at our workplace. I wanted it to be closer to koala size, so I used this exact pattern, but used a heavier yarn and bigger crochet needle, and it still turned out perfect and adorable! Everyone loved that the arms were poseable. A great, easy pattern to follow, and a true joy to make!

And November’s winning review is Heidi W‘s review of my Guinea Fowl pattern:

Although this looked difficult to make it was very well explained by June’s pattern instructions. I absolutely loved the body and neck technique and the finished product looks exactly like her photos! I will definitely be purchasing more patterns from June.

Congratulations, Holly and Heidi – I’ve emailed you both to find out which pattern you’d each like as your prize!

What’s next?

In preparation for my 11th year in business(!) I’m planning some changes for next year. I’m trying to cut out any tasks that are neither important nor enjoyable, to leave me with more time to concentrate on the important and fun parts of my business, and to have more time away from work.

As part of that plan, this will be the last of these ‘monthly update’ posts (I don’t think many people read them, and I can probably spend the time more usefully):

• Any news that’s blogworthy will get its own post, and I’ll save the smaller updates for social media
• For CAL news, follow me on Facebook or join the PlanetJune Ravelry group
• You can see the winners of the monthly Review & Win contest (which is continuing!) on the Review & Win page

I’ll be sharing more about my future plans in my Year in Review post – I think they’ll make a positive difference in my life and in the operations of PlanetJune 🙂

If you haven’t picked up my new Gingerbread Family patterns, you may not know that there are also instructions in there for making a Gingy character (based on the Gingerbread Man from Shrek)…

I made a super-sized Gingy, at over 8″ (21cm) tall, but, of course, you can also make a regular-sized Gingy using my pattern, or a super-sized regular gingerbread man – I just chose to demonstrate two options at once.

Gingy Embellishments

I took the opportunity to demonstrate how versatile the Gingerbread Man pattern is by decorating my super-sized sample as Gingy – you really can decorate your gingerbread men/girls however you wish, just like you do with real gingerbread!

I chose to leave off Gingy’s ‘broken leg’ icing, because I wanted to keep all the embellishments crocheted so you can clearly see how upsizing my regular-sized gingerbread men will look with no other changes. But if you embroidered the embellishments on your gingerbread man instead, you could make much finer lines than with crocheted chains, and add as much detail as you like.

(You can find the full details for the ‘Gingy’ embellishments I made on p9 of the Gingerbread Man pattern.)

Upsizing

I worked the extra-large gingerbread man by holding two strands of yarn together, with a larger hook. (See my Resizing Amigurumi article for my advice on choosing an appropriate hook size when you double your yarn.) This means you can make the embellishments using one strand of the same yarn (and a smaller hook) instead of the embroidery floss embellishments I used for the standard gingerbread men.

A New Yarn Experiment…

Making these amigurumi gave me the opportunity to take some measurements, so now I have a much better estimate of how much additional yarn you’ll need if you hold two strands together. I already knew you’ll need more than just the obvious twice as much (2 strands means 2x yarn length), because each stitch is also larger, so uses more yarn, but how much more?

So, by doubling the yarn and using a correspondingly larger hook, the finished piece was 44% larger, and took 2.7x more yarn – useful to know!

Although this won’t be an exact formula, because it depends on how tightly you crochet at each size, and how big your larger hook is compared with your smaller hook, it gives a good rule-of-thumb indication for yarn quantity when you scale up by doubling the yarn.

(I’ve added this new info to my Resizing Amigurumi article so you can refer back if/when you need it.)

If you’re making Gingerbread Men (or Girls) from my patterns, I’d love to see them! Please join the Christmas crochet-along in the PlanetJune Ravelry group, or post them on social media (and tag @PlanetJune so I can see your post).

I have lots of safari photos to share with you today, from our trip back in July. Of all my experiences in South Africa, this is the one I’d been most looking forward to; Kruger National Park is one of the largest game reserves in Africa and is as large as some European countries! In our short visit, we saw only a tiny fraction of the park and still it was more amazing than anything I could have imagined – we saw dozens of different animals and birds, including all of the Big Five and lots more.

Kruger is about 1800km (1100 miles) as the crow flies from Cape Town – South Africa is a big country!

I’ve taken quite a few of these selfies this year, with me looking dishevelled and slightly delirious at having such a wondrous wildlife experience:

Can you see the reason for my delight, over my shoulder? (Keep reading and you can share my excitement – I have close-up photos and even a little video to share with you…)

So now let’s move onto my proper photos; I’ve spent months trying to choose from over 3000 so I could show you a reasonable number! These galleries have left out a lot, but I hope they give you a taste of the real wild Africa. I’ve split the galleries so you can click into the groups you’re interested in, to see the full-size photos, and skip any you aren’t…

Today I’d like to show you a technique that’ll bring your amigurumi to life when you don’t use shiny plastic eyes. This is particularly useful when you’re making baby-safe or pet toys, where plastic eyes may be a choking hazard.

The Power of the Catchlight

A catchlight is the highlight or glint of a light source reflected in an eye. Compare these kestrel photos I took a few months ago, and you’ll see how appealing a glint in the eye can be:

Where the eye has the magic glint, it brings a spark of life to the photo that makes it irresistible.

The same bird, only a couple of seconds later, but the angle is slightly different, and I didn’t catch a glint in the eye. Although the kestrel is still lovely, do you see how this photo looks dull and lifeless compared with the first?

Now, this principle doesn’t just apply to wildlife photography – the same concept applies in amigurumi! Two-part plastic animal (‘safety’) eyes are the ideal eyes for most amigurumi, because the shiny plastic replicates the shine of real animals’ eyes, giving a glint in the eye which helps to bring your amigurumi to life.

But plastic eyes aren’t always the best solution, especially if you’re making toys for very young children or pets, where plastic eyes may be a choking hazard and should be avoided. Non-plastic eyes can look dull and make your amigurumi feel lifeless, but there’s a simple way to add that spark of life back again.

Adding a Catchlight

If you crochet eyes for your amigurumi or make them from felt or embroidery, I highly recommend that you add a small white dot with white embroidery floss in the upper right quadrant of each eye, to simulate the glint. It makes the eye look more realistic and gives your toy that spark of life. All you need is a tapestry needle and a short length of white embroidery floss per eye.

Compare these two gingerbread men. Even before they have any features added beyond the eyes, there’s a huge difference in appeal:

Without a glint, the eyes have a dull vacant stare. With the glint, they have a sparkle of personality!

How to Add the Glint:

• If you’re embroidering the eye directly onto your piece, you can stitch the catchlight on top of your other stitches.
• If you’re attaching a felt or crocheted circle for the eye, you may find it easier to embroider the catchlight before attaching the eye, as you can then hide the thread ends beneath the eye. (If you plan to glue the eye in place, it’s essential to embroider the catchlight before you apply the glue, as it’s very difficult to embroider onto fabric that’s been hardened with glue!)
• You can also add a catchlight with a dot of white fabric paint, but please do practice on a spare crocheted eye before adding paint directly to your amigurumi, to make sure you’re happy with the result.

Glint Size and Shape
The size and shape of the catchlights aren’t critical. A single stitch can be enough, or, if you prefer a more rounded/square shape, you can make a larger catchlight by making two or three stitches right next to each other. Whatever you decide, try to keep the glint the same size and shape on each eye.

Glint Position
You don’t have to use the upper right corner of the eye, but it’s very important that you add the glint in the same position on each eye – this is one situation where symmetry is definitely wrong! The idea of the catchlight is to suggest that the amigurumi is being lit from one side, and the side with the lamp/sun is the side that reflects that light as a glint. Light typically comes from above, so add the glint above the middle of the eye, but you can choose between the upper right or upper left side for both eyes.

Get Glinting!

This simple technique makes such a difference to any eyes made from fabric, yarn or embroidery floss. I hope you’ll use it every time you make crocheted, felt or embroidered eyes in future, to add an extra spark of life to your amigurumi!

Note: The samples used for this demo are made from my Gingerbread Family crochet patterns.

Loved this tutorial? I have so many more amigurumi tips and tricks to share with you!

Boost your amigurumi skills with my latest book, The Essential Guide to Amigurumi, your comprehensive guide to amigurumi techniques and tips.

Do you find my tutorials helpful? If so, please consider making a contribution towards my time so I can continue to create clear and concise tutorials for you:

Thank you so much for your support! Now click below for loads more crochet video and photo tutorials (and do let me know what else you’d like me to cover in future tutorials…)

Now it’s November, I’m so excited to finally be able to launch my new Christmas patterns that I’ve been developing for the past few months: a perfectly-shaped Gingerbread Man and Girl!

Chunky and flat, just like the edible version, my Gingerbread Family are crocheted amigurumi-style (in a continuous spiral) and are almost seamless, so you have minimal sewing to complete them. I can crochet and assemble a complete Gingerbread Man (minus the face and any other embellishments) in less time than it takes to watch a TV episode, so under 45 minutes – how’s that for speedy?!

I’m imagining an army of amigurumi gingerbread for sale at Christmas craft fairs etc, and easy seasonal gifts for everyone who appreciates a little handmade whimsy. And because they’re flat but double-layered, they make great toys – they’re sturdy to play with and even somewhat poseable!

Gingerbread Man crochet pattern

Gingerbread Man stands 6″ (15cm) tall when crocheted in worsted weight yarn. Add a loop to his head to hang him on the Christmas tree, or stand him up on your desk or the mantelpiece – as he’s flat and stiff, he’ll balance very well if he’s leaning against a wall.

All the embellishment options pictured above are included in the pattern, but Gingerbread Man is the perfect blank canvas for you to decorate however you want – just like the edible kind!

You can create all sorts of expressions and accessories, personalise them to match your family members, and match the embellishment colours to your seasonal decor. Or keep the decorations as simple and fast as you want – it’s completely up to you…

Gingerbread Girl Expansion Pack

The Gingerbread Girl Expansion Pack gives you all the modifications you need to make to the Gingerbread Man pattern to make a gingerbread lady.

Gingerbread Girl is also worked in just 4 pieces, so she’s as fast to finish as a Gingerbread Man. Her skirt is built right into her gingerbread body, and you can either keep her embellishments simple, or add fun little girly details like necklaces, hair bows and a trim on her skirt.

What is an Expansion Pack?

• An Expansion Pack is an add-on to an existing PlanetJune pattern.
• The Expansion Pack lets you modify or add to the original pattern to create something else.
• You cannot use the Expansion Pack alone – you must also purchase the original pattern in order to be able to complete the pictured items in the Expansion Pack pattern.

Choose Your Own Embellishments!

I’ve crocheted all the eyes and embellishments for my gingerbread people – and the patterns include all the details with lots of photos if you’d like to copy mine exactly – but you can also create features using your favourite crafty methods: embroider directly onto the gingerbread with yarn (for chunky details) or embroidery floss (for finer details), cut felt to shape and sew or glue it into place, sew on buttons or beads, use fabric paint, make polymer clay embellishments, and more…

Links to Buy & Launch Discount

As with all my Expansion Packs, you can buy the patterns separately (although please note that you do need the base Gingerbread Man pattern to be able to make a Gingerbread Girl), or there’s a discount when you buy both together.

For this first week of November 2016 only, you can save even more when you buy the Gingerbread Family combo pack for only $6.50 – let’s call that ridiculously low price my Christmas present to you! To get this deal, add the Gingerbread Family to your shopping cart and use code GINGY at checkout.

So, here are your options:

• Buy the value-priced Gingerbread Family multipack (and use discount code GINGY by November 7th 2016 to save even more)
• Buy the classic Gingerbread Man pattern alone
• Buy the Gingerbread Girl Expansion Pack alone (please note, the Expansion Pack only includes the modifications – you’ll also need the Gingerbread Man pattern to be able to make them!)

Or, if you’re not ready to buy yet, click through to Ravelry and favourite/queue them so you won’t forget about them!

Gingerbread Man on Ravelry:
Gingerbread Girl on Ravelry:

Please share pics of your amigurumi gingerbread people on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter (and tag me @PlanetJune so I’ll see them!) and in the PlanetJune Christmas crochet-along in our Ravelry group.

I can’t wait to see how you choose to decorate your crocheted Gingerbread Family!