CONTESTS & GIVEAWAYS

**I've never been all that crafty.  Strangely enough, I tend to supplement book giveaways with things like handmade gift bags and crocheted gnomes.  Go figure.

I have drawn names out of the magical gnome hat to see who won my latest contest, and on June 23 I made the first attempt to contact my 6 lucky peppers. Stay tuned for the winner announcement! If I do not get a response within 2 weeks, I will contact replacement winners. And so on.

Here is a picture of one of the gnome charms I'm giving away:

(Any gift received by winners may not be exactly as pictured...and may be full of the beans.)

If anyone likes to crochet, the gnomes I make are sort of like:

http://bellasartes.blogspot.com/2007/08/simply-gnome-free-pattern.html

The pattern is way too clever to have been created by me so please abide by the requests of the pattern-maker should you feel inspired to create your own gnome charm. Here is the Wiki page about the Japanese art of amigurumi, or crocheting small, cute stuffed toys (I am not joking), which this gnome is apparently representative of: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amigurumi.