PlanetJune Blog: Latest News, Patterns and Tutorials

My favourite yarns for amigurumi (in no particular order) are:

• Lion Brand Vanna’s Choice – although it’s not as soft as my other favourites, it has more substance, which makes for really nice shaping on my amigurumi, and oh! the colours! I’ve never seen such a lovely selection of muted colours. All my Dinosaurs are made with Vanna’s.
  
• Bernat Satin – my first favourite yarn! Although it’s got thinner over the last few years (when you pull it tight, as you do with amigurumi crochet, it really thins down, so it’s hard to avoid leaving some gaps between stitches), I still buy it as it’s dreamily soft and there’s a good selection of neutral colours which is handy for animals, like almost all of my AmiDogs designs.
  
• Red Heart Soft – similar to Satin, but a touch less soft and just that little bit thicker, which makes for a better-looking amigurumi, with less gaps between stitches. There are some gorgeous saturated colours and greens in the range, but it’s a bit limited for neutrals. I used RH Soft to make the boy and girl designs in my book.
  

I use these yarns a lot. All the time, in fact. Between the three, I can always find the perfect yarn for any project I dream up. But that makes me very concerned about what I’m going to do for yarn once I get to South Africa… None of my favourite brands are available over there and I don’t think there’s a South African equivalent for the soft acrylics I use for my amigurumi designs. My plan is to buy as much as possible to ship over when we move, because I just don’t know what kind of designs I’m going to dream up next year, so I can’t plan for which colours I’ll need, or how much of each. My best bet is to stockpile the biggest stash I can manage.

Yesterday, my sister commented that she’d like a way to be able to send me money to put towards building my yarn stash, and I thought, hmm, that sounds like a good idea…

So, if you find my website helpful and you’d like to send me something towards stocking up on yarn to take with me so I can keep designing new patterns and creating new tutorials for you when I’m in South Africa, you can now donate to the PlanetJune Yarn Fund:

It’s like a virtual Tip Jar, but with a specific purpose. I’ll spend every cent donated to the PlanetJune Yarn Fund as frugally as possible, taking advantage of Michaels sales and coupons (I’m in Canada, so Michaels is the only option for me here!) to make the funds go as far as I can and hopefully be able to buy up every colour of my three favourite yarns for amigurumi!

Of course, if you already support me by buying my patterns and accessories or donating for my free patterns, that all helps too – thank you! – but any Yarn Fund monies will all be spent on yarn, not sidetracked into paying for food, electricity, etc 🙂

I thank you for all of your support, financial and otherwise, as I go through this scary, exhausting transitional stage before our new African adventure begins. I can’t even begin to imagine what my life will be like in a few months from now!

ETA: Importing yarn to South Africa to use in my new designs has proven to be a major challenge, between high shipping costs, high import tax, a ridiculously poor exchange rate, postal strikes and postal theft. If you’d like to donate towards the PlanetJune Yarn Fund, it’s still operational, and all donations will be gratefully put towards my next yarn restocking adventure. 🙂

Drumroll, please…. Today I have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a PlanetJune fan or a ferret fan to own a PlanetJune original! It’s very rare that I sell finished pieces – I occasionally accept a commission for a crocheted animal, but I spend almost all my time designing and writing, and prefer to save my hands for crocheting up new designs. But when I came to pack up my toy shelves:

…there was one little baby who stayed behind…

…One little ferret who decided he’d like to be adopted into a new loving home instead of moving to South Africa with me.

This sweet and realistic ferret is a totally one-of-a-kind PlanetJune original. His markings are different to those in my ferret pattern, so you can’t make one like this, even with my pattern!

• He measures 14″ (36cm) long, from the tip of his cute little pink nose to the end of his furry ferret tail.
• He’s crocheted from mohair blend yarns, which makes him fuzzy and fluffy and soft and cuddly.
• Black safety eyes complete his realistic look, so he’s not suitable for children under 3 years old.
• Complete with a signed certificate of authenticity that he was handmade with love by me, June Gilbank!

Would you like to adopt this little sweetie? He’s all ready to go to his new home, and I’ve put him up for auction on eBay with a ridiculously low starting price – far lower than my commissioned rates – so you may end up with a real bargain as well as a one-of-a-kind original!

All proceeds will go to a very good cause: buying a stash of yarn that I can take to South Africa with me so I can continue to create new amigurumi patterns for you in the yarns that you’re familiar with (there’ll be no soft worsted weight acrylics over there: no Bernat, Lion Brand, Red Heart, Patons, Caron… how will I survive?!)

I hope you like my sweet ferret. If you don’t want to place a bid yourself, please pass the link (PlanetJune Ferret auction link) on to anyone else who may be interested in this opportunity.

Or, bid on my ferret right here: PlanetJune Ferret auction 🙂

Thank you!

Happy Groundhog Day! Apart from being my favourite made-up holiday, it’s also time for me to draw January’s ‘Review and Win’ contest winner… This month’s lucky winner is Rita G, with her review of my Detail Stuffing Tool:

I used this stuffing tool and the result was great!! I have crocheted a lot of stuffed animals with the result I used the end of a crochet hook, bamboo stuffing tool, or other means to get stuffing into small places. The results weren’t always good. With this little stuffing tool I had great results finding the stuffing went where I wanted it to go so my animal took shape turning out really cute! I look forward to using this tool again and again! I highly recommend this tool!!

Congratulations, Rita, I’ll email you to find out which pattern you’d like as your prize!

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And now back to the important news of today: none of the famous groundhogs (Punxsutawney Phil, Wiarton Willie, and Shubenacadie Sam) saw their shadows this morning, so that means they all predicted an early spring – let’s hope they were right!

I can’t believe it’s been a whole year since the Groundhog-Along! My crocheted groundhog is hibernating in a box in the basement (together with all my other amigurumi) while we try to sell our house, so he’s passing on prognosticating today. I wonder what all the other amigurumi ‘hogs will predict today..? 🙂

Happy Groundhog Day, everyone! BING!

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!

In plenty of time for Valentine’s Day, I have a new crochet pattern to share today: Love Hearts! String them into a garland, add a pin back to make a cute brooch, or fill a bowl with pretty hearts for Valentine’s Day decorating.

This is a clever little pattern to make sweet hearts in three sizes – each heart builds on the pattern of the previous heart. You can also make a bonus puffy heart to give a total of 4 different designs in this one pattern:

A: Small Heart; B: Medium Heart; C: Large Heart; D: Puffy Heart

It’s a fun pattern; although it’s worked in the round, it’s the opposite of amigurumi, as you’ll use a variety of crochet stitches to form the heart shape. And unlike other hearts I’ve seen, this one has no chains between the stitches, so it forms a nice solid shape. Once you get the hang of the pattern you’ll be able to whip up dozens of hearts in no time at all!

The Love Hearts crochet pattern is free for you to use. If you’d like to thank me with a donation, you’ll get a handy printable PDF version of the pattern as a thank you 🙂

Enjoy!

Go to Love Hearts pattern >>

First pattern of 2011! Actually, this is a bit of a cheat – this was a commissioned pattern that I completed in December, but I haven’t found the time until now to list it in my shop.

AmiDogs Border Collie marks the 18th breed in my AmiDogs series:

You can vary the angle and height of the ear crease to make your ami collie match any special Border Collie in your life, and I also give pattern modifications if you’d like to make a Border Collie with fully erect ears.

Now, this should be the point where I say “and with this 18th design, that means AmiDogs Set 6 is now available to purchase…” but that’s not the case, because all my amigurumi (including the 3 dogs in question), my light tent, and my prop box including the grass and sky backdrop, are all packed away. So, there’ll be no Set 6 multipack for a while at least, until I can take the group photo of them all together!

BUT all is not lost! You can make a custom set including all the breeds who will make up Set 6 (American Akita, Greyhound or Whippet, and Border Collie), or any 3 other breeds of your choice, for the same price.

So you can grab the individual Border Collie pattern, or, to save money, buy him as part of a custom set of any 3 AmiDogs patterns.

Hope you like my collie!

Since before my book was released, I’ve been trying to figure out a way for you to get your copies signed. I’m not ideally located to do signings, and I don’t think my stardom has reached the levels of world signing tours quite yet! Unless you’d like to buy one of my limited edition signed copies, you’ve been out of luck, and that’s just not good enough, is it?

Here’s my solution: I’ve had some exclusive Complete Idiot’s Guide to Amigurumi bookmarks professionally printed, with a nice space in the middle for me to sign your bookmark especially to you. Keep the bookmark in your copy – it’ll be useful as well as a way to get your copy ‘signed’ without the logistical difficulties or costs!

And here’s the best part: as a personal thank you for buying my book, the bookmark is FREE to you if you’re already buying anything that includes a shipping cost (that’s anything from the Eyes, Tools & More category in my shop: eyes, noses, Detail Stuffing Tools, stitch markers, or the hugely popular new Amigurumi Accessory Kits), and, if not, you can just pay the postage cost for me to send it to you. How does that sound?

The signed bookmark is exclusively available as a free product in the PlanetJune shop. To add a bookmark to your next order, just tell me your first name so I can personalize it to you, select your shipping cost (free if you’re buying any other non-pattern items, or select your location as appropriate), and add it to your shopping cart. Easy!

Uh-oh, I’m behind on posting already… Time to catch up!

First up, December’s ‘Review and Win’ contest winner is… Meg P, with her review of my Lacy Bobbles Cowl pattern:

I love the ease, the drape and the finished look of this pattern! It crochets up quickly (maybe two evenings), and is easily adaptable to a variety of yarns, including readily available sock yarn. The diagram, photos and very detailed, clear instructions can help even an inexperienced crocheter make this design. I love the fact that I can print just the pages I need for each project!

Congratulations, Meg, I’ll email you to find out which pattern you’d like as your prize!

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And this is long overdue: Create and Decorate magazine wrote a nice feature on PlanetJune in their Christmas issue (December 2010), focussing mainly on my Detail Stuffing Tool and my Fuzzy Friends crochet patterns. They also kindly sent me a copy of the magazine.

I’d never seen Create and Decorate before – it’s not commonly (if at all) sold in Canada. It’s very much a traditional crafts magazine and, while the majority of the content focuses on a country/primitive style (not really my style), there’s a lot I liked about it. It includes a huge range of projects, covering sewing, rug-hooking, painting, paper craft and more, and – get this – no less than four punchneedle projects (big cheer from me!). The pull-out full-size pattern section is a great bonus if you want to make any of the projects, and there are some techniques in there that got me thinking (embroidered cardboard Christmas ornaments, a rug-hooked 3D Canada Goose, even a Coconut Macaroon recipe… quick, better skip past that page before the temptation gets to strong…)

And then there’s the ‘Finds’ section by Judi Kauffman:

Click to read the feature

Thanks very much to Create and Decorate for featuring me, and a big belated hello to any Create and Decorate readers who are stopping by!