Contest entry by Kelly Lynn Smith
The deadline for the 10th Annual Mochimochi Photo + Video Contest passed a couple of days ago. We’re thrilled to see so many fun entries from all of you mochi makers! I’m glad that we extended the deadline because it seems that many more people were able to participate as a result.
Because we’re getting into heavy holiday season now, we’ll be making the contest announcements in early 2017. Stay tuned!
Believe it or not, it’s now officially time to enter the 10th Annual Mochimochi Photo + Video Contest!
For the 10th year in a row (!!!), we’re looking for the cutest, funniest, most creative photos and videos of Mochimochi Land toys. This year you can enter through your favorite social media platform (see below for details), and you have so much time to enter: the deadline is November 14th, 2016.
Winners will receive awesome prizes from our favorite sponsor Knit Picks, from indie designers Angela Tong and SpillyJane, and from Bonney Teti, my mother-in-law and owner of the World’s Biggest Yarn Stash.
Kouyou by Angela Tong / Cupcake Mittens by SpillyJane
This contest is open to knitters worldwide. To be eligible, your photo or video must contain at least one knitted toy made from a Mochimochi Land pattern. This can be a pattern from the Mochimochi Shop, a pattern from one of the Mochimochi books by Anna Hrachovec, or one of the free patterns on the Mochimochi Blog. The pattern may be modified, but not beyond recognition from the original design. (The use of Photoshop is OK, and other characters, including other knitted toys, are welcome to appear in your photo or video too!)
Note that we’re looking for humor, cuteness, and originality—not necessarily the most professional-looking photos and videos. We want everyone to enter!
PHOTOS: There are three ways to enter photos. Please choose just one, and enter no more than 8 photos.*
1) Post your photo(s) on Instagram with the hashtag #mochiphotocontest16.
2) Post your photo(s) to the Mochimochi Land Facebook page with the hashtag #mochiphotocontest16.
3) Add your photo(s) to the Mochimochi Land Flickr group. All photos uploaded to this group since the December 1st deadline of last year’s photo contest—with the exception of those entered in our recent Mochi Mod Contest—are already entered in this year’s contest!
VIDEOS: First, upload your video to any public video sharing site (like YouTube or Vimeo). Then email me at info@mochimochiland.com with with subject line VIDEO ENTRY, and include a link to your video. Please do not send the video as an attachment. The length of your video can be anywhere from 30 seconds to around 2 minutes long. Please enter no more than 2 videos.
The last day to enter the contest is November 14th, 2016. Update: It’s now DECEMBER 14th! We’ll announce the finalists shortly thereafter here on the blog, and everyone will be able to vote for their favorites! So be sure to check the blog after the deadline.
The first place photo prize will include a $100-value surprise gift package from Knit Picks, fabulous PDF pattern packages from Angela Tong and SpillyJane (two of my favorite designers), an assortment of crafty goodies straight from the World’s Biggest Yarn Stash, and a $20 gift card to Mochimochi Land.
Second and third place photo prizes will include a gift package from Knit Picks ($75 and $50 value, respectively), PDF pattern packages from Angela Tong and SpillyJane, an assortment of goodies from the World’s Biggest Yarn Stash, and a $20 gift card to Mochimochi Land.
The first place video prize will include a $100 gift package from Knit Picks, PDF pattern packages from Angela Tong and SpillyJane, an assortment of goodies from the World’s Biggest Yarn Stash, and six Mochimochi Land kits.
Second and third place video prizes will include PDF pattern packages from Angela Tong and SpillyJane, an assortment of goodies from the World’s Biggest Yarn Stash, and four Mochimochi Land kits.
Thank you to Knit Picks, Angela Tong, SpillyJane, and Bonney Teti for the exciting prizes!
Needles ready? Cameras set? GO!
* This limit doesn’t apply to photos already added to the Flickr group.
You all really came through with fun modified mochis for our first ever Mochi Mod Contest!
The delay in announcing winners is partly because there were so many awesome entries and it was difficult to narrow them down! And also because it’s summer and we wanted to lie in the grass instead of sit in front of a computer. But mostly because there were just so many cool mods to choose from! We were exited to get more than ONE HUNDRED entries.
John and I decided to assign the entries to three categories and choose one from each category. Our winners are the mods that we judged to be the most creative and most unexpected.
As you can see, Rapunzel is a mod of the Neck Nuzzler pattern from Knitting Mochimochi! We love how the knitter turned the nuzzler on its head so that ears become legs, and the theme of longness shared by both characters is brilliant too. Super!
How cool is this guy!! The eyes and wooly hair really make him, of course, but we were impressed to read in the caption that The Lorax is modified from the Tiny Alien pattern from Teeny-Tiny Mochimochi, AND his tree stump is modified from the Plucky Mushrooms pattern from Knitting Mochimochi. Nicely done!
All hail the cupcake crown! The tiny cupcakes are from the pattern in Teeny-Tiny Mochimochi, with a modified massive cupcake to top it off. We love this ambitious wearable mod.
Each of our top three winners will receive a $20 Mochimochi Land gift card, a six-skein rainbow from Bonney Teti’s World’s Biggest Yarn Stash…
And a temporary tattoo and an itty-bitty unicorn!
I promised you a randomly selected winner too.
I think we all know what pattern these guys are modified from. Love their different rockstar personas!
KnittyKitty99 will receive this random prize.
Winners, I’m contacting you via the websites you submitted from.
Thank you to everyone who participated with their mods! I’ll be sharing more of the cool entries here soon. I think we should hold this contest again sometime, so be thinking about your next mochi mods!
The prize yarn from Bonney’s World’s Biggest Stash has arrived!
The three winners of the Mochi Mod Contest will each receive six balls of Sassy Skein yarn in a rainbow of colors! Bonney loves this yarn because it’s colorful (obviously) and it’s 100% cotton, making it perfect for washcloths and toys that will be played with.
You know, I just visited the Sassy Skein blog to read that they have closed their operations. Sad! So, this is a good opportunity to get some of their yarn before it’s really hard to find.
You have until July 5th to enter the contest—details here.
Update: Congratulations to the winners! (And thank you for more than 100 entries!)
Update: This contest is now closed for entries. Thank you for all the mods! I’m very excited by what we got. I’ll post the winners soon!
Update: Here’s the awesome rainbow of yarn that our top three winners will receive!
It seems like every week I’m pleasantly surprised by some cool new mod that someone has done with a Mochimochi Land pattern, ideas that make me say Why didn’t I think of that?? Your mods are so genius, I want to see more! So now I’m announcing the first ever Mochi Mod Contest, to get more mods out of you.
What is a mod? It’s short for modification, that thing that knitters do naturally when they’re making something using a pattern, and adding their personal twist that transforms the project into something different. It can be as simple as GnomeGranny’s Star Wars Chickens, or as complex as this stripy mustachioed Roary by Knittist24, or as monstrously cute as the Sully and Mike by Amanda that you see above.
Let’s get to the details!
Eligibility
This contest is open to knitters worldwide. To be eligible, your photo must contain at least one knitted toy made from a Mochimochi Land pattern. (This can be a pattern from the Mochimochi Shop, a pattern from one of the Mochimochi books by me, or one of the free patterns on the Mochimochi Blog.) The pattern SHOULD be modified in some way, but it should have been made with the basic instructions from a specific Mochimochi Land pattern.
We’re looking for originality in your mod—not necessarily the most professional-looking photo. We want everyone to enter!
How to enter
There are three ways to enter. Please choose just one, and submit no more than 6 photos.
1) Post your photo(s) on Instagram with the hashtag #mochimodcontest AND a note saying which Mochimochi Land pattern you based your mod on.
2) Post your photo(s) to the Mochimochi Land Facebook page with the hashtag #mochimodcontest AND a note saying which Mochimochi Land pattern you based your mod on.
3) Add your photo(s) to the Mochimochi Land Flickr group with the hashtag #mochimodcontest AND a caption saying which Mochimochi Land pattern you based your mod on.
Deadline
The last day to enter the contest is July 5th, 2016. We’ll choose three winning mods shortly thereafter, plus one winner who will be chosen at random!
Prizes!
Each of our top three winners will receive a $20 Mochimochi Land gift card and a rainbow of yarn from the World’s Biggest Stash!
The randomly chosen winner will get a random surprise prize!
(Thanks to my mother-in-law, Bonney Teti, for diving into her stash for prizes!)
Image usage
Please note that any images submitted to this contest may be used by me for promotion of this contest or a future contest.
I can’t wait to see the mod madness!
The results are in! We are thrilled to announce the winners of the 9th Annual Photo + Video Contest. Thank you to all of you who entered—this is our favorite Mochimochi Land tradition, and we’re so happy that it’s been going for nine whole years. I say it every year, but it continues to be true: the creativity and enthusiasm that you knitters put into Mochimochi Land are what keep me inspired to come up with new ideas, characters, and projects.
Big thanks are also in order for our sponsors, Knit Picks and Australian Homespun magazine, plus Franklin Habit and my MIL, Bonney Teti, for providing the best prizes yet this year.
Now for the winners in the photo category!
In third place is the adorable Where Do I Begin by Salla.
Salla wins a $10 gift certificate to Knit Picks, a $10 gift certificate to Mochimochi Land, and a Team Macho bag from Bonney Teti’s yarn stash.
In second place is the colorful Frogs by TheBon.
TheBon wins a $10 gift certificate to Knit Picks, a 12-month print subscription to Australian Homespun magazine, a $10 gift card to Mochimochi Land, and a tote bag and vintage knitting patterns from Bonney.
And our top photo winner is… Animal Crackers by KnitWit685!
KnitWit685 wins a $50 gift certificate to Knit Picks, a 12-month print subscription to Australian Homespun, a Dolores sketch by Franklin Habit, and a tote bag and more from Bonney.
Next, we have video winners to announce! We got quite a few cute videos, so we also have three winners in this category!
In third place is Baby’s First Christmas by SARAnades In String.
SARAnades wins three mystery kits! (These will be available in the shop soon too.)
In second place is Snail Trails by Juleenbean.
Juleen wins three mystery kits and a $10 gift certificate to Mochimochi Land.
And finally, our first place winner in the video category is… Fiber Club by Jen Potter!
Jen wins a Giant Toys Kit from Knit Picks, a 12-month print subscription to Australian Homespun, a Dolores sketch by Franklin Habit, and three mystery kits.
Congratulations to these very creative knitters! And that wraps up the 9th Annual Mochimochi Photo + Video Contest—thank you again to all who participated with entries and voting.
Feeling inspired? It’s not too early to enter next year’s contest! All photos added to the Mochimochi Friends Flickr group will automatically be entered in the 10th Annual Mochimochi Photo Contest for later this year, and anytime you want to send in a video entry (by emailing a link to info [at] mochimochiland [dot] com) we’ll consider it for the next contest. We hope the next contest will be our biggest yet!
Thank you all once again for your entries in the 9th Annual Mochimochi Photo Contest! And thank you for your patience with us as we’ve waited until now to share the results and have the vote. I hope 2015 ended nicely for you all—we certainly had a memorable holiday season with the addition of our little Leo.
Today we’re revealing the Honorable Mentions in the photo portion of our contest, and soon we’ll have the big vote on the finalist photos. The winning video (chosen by John and me) will be presented along with the winning photos a bit later.
So without further ado, here are your Honorable Mentions! These photos didn’t quite make it into our finalist group, but we found them charming and are excited to share them here. See the full images close up after the jump!
Since Christmas is fast approaching and everyone is busy with travel, parties, and holiday prep these last few weeks in December, we’re going to wait until after the holidays to post results from the Photo + Video Contest. I hate to make you all wait, but on the other hand I think it will be a great way to start the new year.
I hope everyone is having a happy holiday season—stay tuned for a special animation in the meantime!