Rules
Seasons of Lace – Summer of Lace 2011 Rules
Note: These rules are still a work in progress and will be modified from season to season as we learn.
What is Seasons of Lace?
It’s a repeating seasonal Knit Along (KAL ) for Lace Knitting. There are no pattern requirements, and no yarn requirements. Just knit some lace — knit what you want, how you want to, where you want to, as much as you want to! Enjoy the foliage, the first snowfalls, the spring rains, the first blooming flower and your knitting. Then stop in from time to time to tell us what you are up to and show us some yummy pictures.
Every season we learn from the last and the rules change a bit, please don’t forget to check in on the rules when you are signing up each season.
And, oh yeah, there are some prizes and you have to do some stuff to be eligible. But its pretty easy – so don’t worry.
When can I start?
Registration for Summer of Lace 2011 opened June 1, 2011. You can register right here on the blog by submitting a registration form between June 1 and July 15, 2011. For this Summer Season (Summer of Lace 2011), official knitting starts started on June 21, 2011. (Projects that are both started and finished during a single knit-along season earn you extra chances at prizes).
Wait You Said Prizes – more than once!
Yep we are planning on prizes. There are a few different ways to get prizes:
- One of your projects could win the most votes from our viewers or judges in a Judged Contest..
- Your posts to the blog in one of our categories (and pretty much everything fits in a category), qualify you for raffle prizes.
- Your posts to the blog in the Support Our Sponsors category that demonstrate that you are using our Sponsors’ Wares qualify you for the Support Our Sponsors Raffle.
- Or you could just get lucky – anyone who posts at least twice is eligible for whatever Random Joy give-aways the mods feel like doing.
So you say you’ve got a cool thing that would make a great prize?
Yes we LOVE our sponsors! We love them so much we even are giving participants bonus chances to win prizes if they shop with you. We’ll also give you a link or a blog button on the side of the main blog page, and a big banner on the Prize page. We are trying to think up new ways to send folks over to our sponsors so there might be more coming for donors in the future. If you are interested in donating something, or offering a discount to our members, please go fill in a form, and we’ll send you an email or give you a call ASAP.
Okay those are the basics. I’m guessing you realize that if we say “basics” three are likely to be gritty details; we’ve posted them below.
More Details – gritty details below
Summer of Lace June 22 – September 21
All participants need to register for this Season by July 15th
Spring Into Lace – March 22 – June 21
Summer of Lace – June 22 – September 21
Fall into Lace – September 22- December 21
All participants need to register for the Spring, Summer and Fall seasons by the 15th of April, July, or October (depending on the season).
- Knitting for the Judged Contests and the Raffle Entries can be started (but not finished) before the first day of the season. At least 50% of the knitting must have been done (and posted about) during one or more Seasons of Lace seasons. If that 50% was not during the current season, be sure to identify it as Season Spanning Lace.
- Knitting for the Resurrected Lace raffles must have been started no later than the last two weeks of the season before the season just past (e.g. for Summer 2011, the project may not have been started after March 7, 2011), and may not have appeared in any SoL post during the season prior to the current one (e.g. for Summer 2011, it can’t have appeared on SoL during Spring 2011).
- To be eligible for competitions and/or prizes, projects need to be posted to the blog by last day of the season.
More on how to win those prizes:
Raffles
Everyone who starts or finishes a project during the knit-along is has the ability to be registered for the raffle prizes. Each project can earn up to 2 raffle entries (in every category it fits in) for you. One when you start (or resurrect) it, and one when you finish it.
- When you start your project
- Log in to the Seasons of Lace Blog and create a new post about your project.
- Describe your project and show or link to a picture.
- Assign the post to the Casting On category in which your item fits. (ex Cast on – Beaded lace, Cast on – Wee Lace, etc.)
- If the project is part of a Seasonal KAL, also assign your post to the KAL’s category.
- When you introduce a Resurrected Project
- Log into the Seasons of Lace Blog and create a new post.
- Describe your project, including some information about how long it has been languishing, and show a picture.
- Assign the post to the Resurrected – Introduction category.
- When you complete the project
- Log in to the Seasons of Lace Blog and create a new post.
- Describe your project and show or link to a picture.
- Assign the post to the Bound Off category in which your item fits. (ex Bound off – Beaded lace, Bound off – Wee Lace, Resurrected etc.)
- If the project is part of a Seasonal KAL, also assign your post to the KAL’s category.
Each one of these steps earns you one chance at the raffle. If you have a project that you start before the knit-along, you can still earn one raffle “ticket” for it, by finishing it during this season. (Projects that have been knit during successive seasons will qualify when you finish as long as you blogged about them in the prior season). Like-wise with a project you start during the knit-along but don’t finish until after the knit-along – you get a chance for casting on, and will get another chance in the season in which you finish it.
So what are these categories that you keep talking about?
- Newbie Lace Knitters – If you are knitting one of your first three lace projects you qualify! {Retired Category}
- Handspun Lace – Knit from your own handspun {Retired Category — will be resurrected if sought after}
- I Designed it Myself! – For projects designed by the knitter.
- Lace Knitting by Size -
- Wee – using up to 400 yards
- Small – 401-800 yards of yarn
- Medium -801-1800 yards of yarn
- Large – 1801-and up {Retired Category}
- Beaded Lace
- Gift Lace – lace projects knit with the intent of giving them away.
- Charity Lace – lace projects knit with the intent of, and then given either directly to a charity (like the Red Scarf Project) or as a raffle or auction item for a charity fundraiser. {Retired Category, combined with Gift Lace}
- Resurrected Lace – lace projects that had been allowed to hibernate, but were resurrected during this season. (They need not have appeared in any season, but must have lain fallow for at least one season to qualify)
- Season Spanning Lace – Lace that has taken more than one season to finish – it should have appeared in the past season as well as this one.
- Support Our Sponsors – Knit your project with yarn, needles, patterns, or stitch markers purchased from one (or more) of our sponsors — and post about it to the blog with pictures and a link to the sponsor.
We will run raffles for every category with at least seven different people posting. For categories with lots and lots of entries, we’ll offer second (and even third) round raffle prizes if we have enough prizes. To qualify for the end of season raffles, you need to be registered for the current season, and to have posted about your lace knitting four times over the course of the season.
However, to qualify for any Support Our Sponsors Raffle, you’ll need to have posted to the blog at least twice.
Judged Contests
Throughout the season you’ll have an opportunity to nominate your projects/posts and other people’s projects/posts the Judged Competitions. You can nominate any post or project for as many of these categories as you’d like.
- Lace on Display – Best photograph of a finished lace object – we look at the presentation, the lighting, etc. not so much the knitting itself.
- Lace Partnership – Best combination of lace pattern and yarn
- Lace on the Road – Pictures of lace in progress or finished, that was knit while traveling — anywhere for any reason.
- Viewers Choice Award – any picture of lace you like.
We will be inviting several lace-wise and camera-wise folks to help with the judging. Your friendly neighborhood Moderators will review all the nominations for each contest in which we have received nominations for at least five projects, and send them along to the Guest Judges. The Mods and Judges will vote on their favorite for each contest. The winners will be announced on the blog. All projects ARE eligible for more than one contest.
How do I qualify a project or post for the Judged Contests?
All projects that are posted to the Seasons of Lace Blog are eligible to be nominated during the season in which they were posted.
How can I nominate a project or post for a Judged Contest?
If you see a post or project that you want to nominate just click the title of the post and scroll to the bottom of the page. After the comments there will be a nomination form. Fill it in YOUR name and email address, add any comments you’d like, and check the boxes next to the contests you are nominating the post for, hit nominate and you are all done. If a post shows more than one project, be sure to identify which project you are nominating, or the nomination will be invalid (as much as the mods want to facilitate this, we don’t always have time at season’s end to email for confirmation on which project you meant to nominate).
Random Joy Drawings
How do I qualify for the Random Joy drawings?
- Register for the blog.
- Register for the current season
- Post on the blog. How many posts it takes to qualify for a given Random Joy drawing depends on how far into the season we are:
To qualify for the first Random Joy raffle , the number of posts you need will depend on how long you’ve been registered for the season.- If you registered before the 25th of the month in which the season started (e.g. June 25 for the summer season), you’ll need two posts about your lace knitting. If you’ve registered after the 25th, you’ll only need one.
From the date of the first Random Joy Raffle until the end of second month of the season (e.g. for Summer, the end of July), you’ll need two posts about your lace knitting to qualify for a Random Joy Raffle.
From the first of the third month of the season (e.g. for Summer, August 1), you’ll need to have posted thrice (that’s three times) about your lace knitting to qualify for Random Joy.
To qualify for the end of season raffles, you’ll have to have posted to the blog about your lace knitting four times over the course of the Season.
That’s all. You’re entered.
See we told you it was simple. 
Prizes:
We will be issuing prizes in the following ways:
- For each Judged Contest, we will collate the nominations, poll the membership for their votes, and then combine the collective voice of the membership with the individual voices of the judges to choose a winner. We’ll announce the winners and prizes as soon as we can.
- For the Viewers Choice Contest, we will collate the nominations, and poll the member ship for their votes. We will announce a prize only after at least 2/3 of the participating members have voted.
- For the Raffle categories, the prizes will be awarded by a random draw for each category. They will be announced on the blog as they are awarded.
- Random Joy prizes will be awarded as the quantity of prizes allows and will be announced on the blog.
- The prizes are currently in the works. Many are already listed (with pics!) in the Prize Closet (see, over there…). We’ll be updating them as more information comes in.
More Ways to Win
Want more ways to add to the number of chances you get to win in the Random Joy draws? Try donating a prize! For every prize you donate, we’ll give you one more chance to win in the Random Joy draws. Similarly, if you can persuade your LYS to donate a prize, we’ll give you an extra chance to win (be sure your LYSO lets us know who inspired them to donate.) If you’re donating a prize, contact us so that we can both give you proper credit and get your prize listed in the prizes page.
