A quickie giveaway: Win a mini shawl pin + Eleven Hills hand-sewn pouch!

It's time for another giveaway! Woohoo! ;D

This one's a quick one, compared to my usual: The deadline is Sunday, March 13 at 5 p.m. Eastern time — or rather, that's when we'll be doing the drawing for the winner, so get your entries in before then.

I'm happy to announce this is my first joint giveaway, with the lovely Agnes of Eleven Hills! Yayyy! One winner will receive a lovely hand-sewn sun, moon and stars pouch from Eleven Hills, and one star-shaped handmade copper miniature shawl pin from Star & Crossbones. Here they are, in all their celestial goodness:


A close-up of the star charm pin (a.k.a. the miniature shawl pin):


And the front and back of the pouch:




How to enter the giveaway:

• Visit both the Star and Crossbones Etsy shop and the Eleven Hills Etsy shop and pick a favorite item from each shop — then post your picks in the comments on this blog post for one entry!
• You can also enter by posting your picks as a comment on the giveaway announcement here on the Eleven Hills Facebook page.
• And you get extra entries for posting about the giveaway on Facebook or on Twitter. Just post a comment on this blog post saying you tweeted or posted on Facebook. :)
• Don't forget to leave contact information with each entry so we know how to reach you if you win. :D

Remember, the drawing for the winner will happen at 5 p.m. Eastern time on Sunday, March 13!

And feel free to share this with your friends ... Maybe you can split the winnings if one of you wins! ;)

October goodies: the knitters' wish list giveaway

It's time for another giveaway! This one is for all the knitters out there who are gearing up for cooler weather (or maybe it's already arrived where you are?). It's the First Ever Wish List Giveaway, and it's a winning situation for everybody! You have a chance to get free stuff, and I get to have people ogling my pattern, which will help motivate me to finish the ones in my design queue. (Oh, yes ... I have manymany plans for more patterns. No way I'm going to finish designing everything I want to this autumn/winter, but I can sure try.)

Anyway. Remember these fingerless gloves?




I'm giving away FIVE copies of the pattern PDF. Because everybody needs toasty hands.

You get one entry into the drawing for doing each of these things:

1. "Heart" the pattern in my Etsy shop. (Make sure your favorites are publicly visible so I can see you, or you can heart the pattern and post a comment here if your favorites aren't public.)
2. Add the pattern to your Ravelry queue.
3. Add the pattern to your Ravelry favorites.
4. Leave a comment on this blog post telling me what sorts of things you like to do best in autumn.
5. Tweet, post on Facebook* fan S&C on Facebook and post a comment about it here on the blog, and/or blog about the giveaway using this link: http://bit.ly/9T7T6Y, and comment about it on this post. If you tweet, please also mention @starncrossbones so I can see you! ;)

Entries close after October 31, and shortly after that date, I'll draw five random numbers, and five lucky knitters will get to download the pattern from my Ravelry store. Yayyy! I'll actually be drawing one winner each from the people who have the pattern favorited on Etsy, from those who have the pattern queued on Ravelry, and from those who have it favorited on Ravelry — and the last two winners will come from the comments on this post. So you have a ton of ways to win, and yes, you can enter through every method you can, to maximize your chances. How cool is that? I think it's pretty cool.

And if you're not a knitter, you can even enter on behalf of someone else. (Like if you know a knitter who's not online, or one who doesn't like to enter contests ... I'm sure there's someone out there like that, right? ;)) If you win, and you don't knit, but you want to gift the pattern to someone you know who DOES knit, just let me know and we'll make sure it gets to them. :D

And in the meantime, I'll work on finishing the pair of Princess in the Wilds gloves I started knitting in January out of ridiculous sparkly blue handspun wool.


"Finish me!" whispered the bright and sparkly handspun fingerless gloves...

*"Posting on Facebook" is no longer an option for entries because apparently Facebook doesn't like people talking about giveaways there without permission. Nice.

Shawl pin giveaway: hurricanes on my mind

It's June 1st, so hurricane season is officially open here in Florida. From now through November 30, we'll all be watching for those lovely spiral shapes in the local radar images. It doesn't look much like the stormy season, does it?


But there are storm clouds lurking on the horizon...


Actually, I like hurricane season. Maybe that sounds a little crazy. But I was born in Florida, and I've spent most of my life here — and not by accident or out of laziness. The often-extreme weather is an old friend, and hurricane season is the rainy season. I love thunderstorms — the fresh smell of ozone and of water cooling the pavement and in the air, the sound of an army of little droplets on the roof, the looming clouds with all their shadow and light, the fleeting complexity of a distant lightning flash. It's nice to have a break from the crispy-making summer sun, and to have the contrast of a little cloudy murk to help me appreciate the sun more when it comes back.

So, for the love of hurricane season, I made a mini copper shawl pin — a scarf pin? — in a tiny hurricaney spiral.


Stats: Swirl measures approx. 2 inches by 1 1/2 inches; pin is 4 inches long; all made of hand-hammered copper wire.
And because last month I met and passed two of my little-but-significant 2010 goals — reaching 70 Etsy shop hearts and 140 Facebook fans — I offer this little pin to you as my very first giveaway.

The Prizes

First prize: One person will win the handmade mini shawl pin in the picture AND 15% off any item in the Star & Crossbones Etsy shop.

Runner-up prizes: Two other people will receive 10% off any item in the Etsy shop.

How to Enter: Leave a comment on this post (make sure to leave me some way of contacting you, too!) and let me know one of the following things:

• your favorite season, and why it's your favorite;
• something fun and little-known about yourself; or
• an idea for something you'd like to see made into a shawl pin.

How to Get Bonus Entries:

• Tweet about the giveaway. Include a link to this post and make sure the tweet is @starncrossbones, so I can see you and count your entry!
• Follow me on Twitter @starncrossbones, and post a comment here about it OR tweet at me so I can follow you back. ;D
• "Like" Star & Crossbones on our Facebook fan page and post a comment about it on our fan page wall or here on the blog.
• Add the Star & Crossbones Etsy shop to your favorites (a.k.a. "heart" us!) and leave a comment about it here.

If, for some reason, you have trouble leaving a comment, you can use the contact form on the Star & Crossbones Web site to send me your entry information and I'll add you to my files manually. I don't want anyone to get left out due to technical difficulties!

Entries will close after June 15, 2010.

Someone wants to give my little baby hurricane pin a good home, right? Look at it, just waiting for your admiration and love! ;)


To all who enter: Good luck, and thank you most kindly for your interest! :D