{"id":3126,"date":"2010-06-11T12:37:47","date_gmt":"2010-06-11T16:37:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/?p=3126"},"modified":"2025-03-16T14:12:44","modified_gmt":"2025-03-16T18:12:44","slug":"4th-blogiversary-contest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/4th-blogiversary-contest\/","title":{"rendered":"4th blogiversary + contest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Don&#8217;t forget to enter the contests at the end of this post!<\/em><\/p>\n<h2>Year 4 Review<\/h2>\n<p>The PlanetJune craft blog will be 4 years old tomorrow. It&#8217;s hard to believe it; every year has flashed past so quickly!\u00a0So what exactly have I been doing with myself for the past year? I&#8217;ve:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Designed and published 17 new crochet patterns:<\/li>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/year4_crochetpatterns.jpg\" alt=\"planetjune year 4 crochet patterns\" \/><\/p>\n<li>Self-published my first eBook,\u00a0<em><a href=\"\/shop\/index.php?main_page=index&amp;cPath=27\">The Punchneedle Handbook<\/a><\/em><\/li>\n<li>Designed and published 9 punchneedle embroidery patterns:<\/li>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/year4_punchneedlepatterns.jpg\" alt=\"planetjune year 4 punchneedle patterns\" \/><\/p>\n<li>Had my <a href=\"\/blog\/one-yard-wonders\/\">pincushion and needlebook<\/a> patterns published in the book <em>One Yard Wonders<\/em><\/li>\n<li>Somehow managed to find time for some other crafts and tutorials:<\/li>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/year4_stuff.jpg\" alt=\"planetjune year 4 crafty stuff\" \/><\/p>\n<li>Won the\u00a0<a href=\"\/blog\/about\/crocheted-orangutan\/\">Critter Contest<\/a> and <a href=\"\/blog\/best-of-2009-award\/\">Craftster&#8217;s Best of 2009<\/a>; nominated for <a href=\"\/blog\/bobby-award-nominee\/\">3 Bobby awards<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/crochetliberationfront.wordpress.com\/2010-crochet-awards-nominees\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">a Flamie award<\/a><\/li>\n<li>Wrote, photographed and illustrated my upcoming crochet book,\u00a0<em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/1615640037?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=plane02c-20&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=9325&amp;creativeASIN=1615640037\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Complete Idiot&#8217;s Guide to Amigurumi<\/a><\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>That last item was the biggie that&#8217;s occupied most of my time since last summer; writing a 200-page book is no easy task. But it&#8217;s finally finished and I can&#8217;t wait to be able to see the finished book when it&#8217;s released in October!<\/p>\n<h2>Tiny Acorns&#8230;<\/h2>\n<p>I thought I&#8217;d take a step back and return to the first post I ever published on this blog (reproduced here in its entirety):<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/firstpost.jpg\" alt=\"first post at planetjune\" \/><br \/>\n<em>The tiny acorn that became PlanetJune&#8230;<\/em><\/p>\n<p>When I started PlanetJune, I had a small goal &#8211; to inspire creativity by keeping track of my crafts on the blog. From that one small goal I&#8217;ve:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Met the most amazing and inspirational creative people<\/li>\n<li>Developed the confidence to start designing patterns<\/li>\n<li>Become an artist and a teacher<\/li>\n<li>Written and illustrated my first book (with a second book on the way)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&#8230;and, in only four years, turned a little crafty hobby into my full-time occupation &#8211; something I would never have dreamed could occur when I first set out on this journey. They say to dream big, but dreaming small and having the reality exceed your wildest expectations is pretty special too!<\/p>\n<h2>Where Next?<\/h2>\n<p>That&#8217;s not to say I&#8217;m at the point I&#8217;d like to be with my business and my creative career. My goal for the coming year is to build my business to the point where I no longer have that niggling feeling that I should really go and get myself a &#8216;real&#8217; job &#8211; a feeling that comes down to the grim reality of earning enough money to continue to support myself. I&#8217;m paying my own way at the moment, but I&#8217;m far from earning the salary I used to make pre-self-employment.\u00a0And that&#8217;s okay: I&#8217;ve changed my lifestyle too; I no longer buy clothes I don&#8217;t need or DVDs I&#8217;ll never watch. I don&#8217;t have any expensive hobbies, and my craft purchases are all business expenses! I do what I love, and I love what I do.<\/p>\n<p>But, to continue to succeed I need to grow and expand the business. I wish I had a crystal ball: I have a lot of exciting ideas, and it&#8217;s hard to know where I should invest my time. It&#8217;ll be interesting to see where I am by my 5th blogiversary!<\/p>\n<h2>Contests<\/h2>\n<p>You, my readers, have given me so much support and encouragement along this journey so far, and so I&#8217;d like to give something back! I\u2019m running 2 contests:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Win any single pattern (your choice) from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\">my store<\/a>. (FYI, each PocketAmi set counts as one pattern.)<\/li>\n<li>Win one of my exclusive <a href=\"\/shop\/index.php?main_page=product_info&amp;cPath=10&amp;products_id=109\">Detail Stuffing Tools<\/a> &#8211; a must-have for stuffing amigurumi or small plush toys!<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/blog\/images\/stuffingtool1.jpg\" alt=\"Detail Stuffing Tool by planetjune\" \/><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>To enter, leave me a comment on this post, including:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Your choice of prize \u2013 type<strong> TOOL<\/strong> or\u00a0<strong>PATTERN<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Tell me something, e.g. a suggestion for a future design, something you\u2019d like to see on PlanetJune, or a suggestion for how to take my business to the next level. Anything goes \u2013 I just want to hear from you!<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>If you want to enter\u00a0<strong>both<\/strong> contests, just leave me 2 comments!<\/p>\n<p>On Friday 18th June at 5pm EST, I will draw one name from each set of TOOL comments, and one from each set of PATTERN comments. (In the unlikely event that the same person \u2018wins\u2019 both, I&#8217;ll contact them to see which prize they would prefer, and then draw another name for the other contest winner). Good luck!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Don&#8217;t forget to enter the contests at the end of this post! Year 4 Review The PlanetJune craft blog will be 4 years old tomorrow. It&#8217;s hard to believe it; every year has flashed past so quickly!\u00a0So what exactly have I been doing with myself for the past year? I&#8217;ve: Designed and published 17 new [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-craft-business"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3126"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3126\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24365,"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3126\/revisions\/24365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.planetjune.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}