Want to help us CELEBRATE THE BOY?

Hi friends! Today I'm thinking about February. Does that sound strange? Well to me it's not. Dana of MADE and I have already decided that we're doing another Celebrate the BOY series in February 2011, and when something so involved has to happen in February you would be crazy to start talking about it in January. You start TALKING about it in October, you start THINKING about it in November, you try to just SURVIVE December, and then in January you actually start DOING some of the stuff you want on the blog in February so that you don't actually die when it happens. See?

For those of you who weren't around last year (welcome new readers!), this will be a month completely focused on the BOY. We feel strongly that boys get the shaft when it comes to sewing and crafting, and for a whole month we do our best to rectify that. Last year in addition to our own posts and tutorials we had a ton of guest posts, a number of giveaways, and lots of BOY roundups. If you'd like to check it out, you can see MADE's Celebrate the Boy 2010 archive here and Made By Rae's here. You can also take a look at the Celebrate the BOY photo pool which now has thousands of reader-submitted photos.So the two of us were talking the other day. We decided that the main reason last February was so insane was not that we'd really overextended or overscheduled ourselves; it was trying to keep up with all of the emails that flooded in when people found out what we were doing and wanted to participate, either in the form of ideas, tutorials, or giveaways. And it was hard because while we were thrilled to get such an enthusiastic response and we did make an effort to accommodate many of those requests, we also had to write a ton of "no I'm sorry we're all scheduled up" type emails. I guess we could have just ignored everything, but I honestly believe that some great ideas would have never seen the light of day and that would have been a shame.So this year we'd like to invite you to submit your ideas for BOY month ahead of time. We're setting up a special email account specifically for Celebrate the BOY and both Dana and I will have access to it.  If you would like to contribute in some way to CTB 2011, please email us (click for the address) now and tell us about it. Friends, strangers, new bloggers, old bloggers!  Submissions will be accepted until the end of this year. We will sift through the emails and pick a few favorites to turn into blog posts on MADE or Made By Rae in addition to the things we already have scheduled. Specifically we are looking for tutorials and other ideas for posts relating to unique sewn or crafted items for boys of all ages. If possible we prefer to link TO your blog with a teaser post to bring traffic to your site rather than keeping full posts on our websites. Preference will be given to strong visual styling and good photography. Send us a description of what you are thinking along with links to things you've done in the past if possible so we can scope it out. And feel free to send us something you've already posted; it doesn't have to be a brand new idea!We'd also like to have some cool giveaways for our readers during Celebrate the BOY. If you have a sewing or crafting business and would like to give away something for boys or parents of boys, or sewing or crafting items that are boy-related, let us know.DISCLAIMER. The following things may seem obvious but still need to be said:1. We will not be able to include everything that gets sent to us. What we post on our blog will be based on our own personal preferences and we appreciate your understanding.2. We will not steal any ideas without giving credit. BUT it should come as no surprise to you that many of the ideas floating around in CraftBlogLand are similar or even (gasp!) the SAME. That's how that goes, and again, we appreciate your understanding.Please submit your ideas no later than December 31, 2010.  We look forward to hearing from you!