Riley Blake Dress Up Days Scalloped Quilt

Back at the beginning of this year, I decided to make S.R. her own quilt, and to turn her room into a bigger girl room. When I was pregnant with her, I made one for E, which you can see here at the end of his bed. I felt it was time she had her own "made by Mommy" quilt. 

Her favorite color is purple, so I searched for several weeks to find the perfect combinations of fabrics. Riley Blake had a line called Dress Up Days, and S.R. and I both fell in love with the prints!

After seeing the Girl Inspired's Scallop Quilt, I knew that would be the perfect design for S.R.

I will have to say, this was a rather expensive quilt to put together. S.R. has a full size bed, so I had to purchase extra fabric. After all the blood, sweat and tears (yes, all three occurred), it was definitely worth the fuss.

I attempted to machine quilt it myself. However my machine messed up and the bobbin stitches were all loopy, so a very dear friend and I had to pick stitches for over 3 hours. Bless her! I decided to throw in the towel and send it off to be quilted. I'm so glad that I did. I love the end result. The flower stitching is a perfect match to this whimsical fabric.

I had a lucky find at Target the other day as well. They had this bed skirt marked 50% off. Just an FYI, purple really isn't "in" right now, so it was fairly difficult to find coordinates for this bedding. There is a lot of purple and pink, but not a whole lot of purple and orange.

The matching throw pillows were made with the ruching technique, and the puppy pillow was my first attempt at hand embroidery.  Pillows are one of the easiest ways to really dress up an area!

The sheets were purchased at Walmart, and I was really excited that the polka dots matched the colors in her quilt!

I have two or three more things to finish up in the room...a valance, an art project and an accessory or two to add, and her bigger girl room will be complete!

Stay tuned to see some of the other areas of her room! 

To see the before, you can go here!

New Chore Charts

Now that summer break is here, I decided it was time to reinstate the chore responsibilities for the kiddos. Last year, I made a chore list, and my intentions were to teach E and S.R. responsibility and the value of hard work, but my system was truly broken and our excitement for it lasted all of one week. 

Expecting my kids to do the same things over and over again day after day was just expecting too much. I certainly don't do the same things day after day. We all need a little variety, right?

So to fix my broken system, I searched on line for age appropriate chores. 

It's truly amazing what little ones can do...we really don't give them enough credit. If you check my Pinterest board, you can visit the sites where I found my ideas...

This particular idea came from the Martha Stewart website.

 Thankfully this little project was mostly free to me. I had one sheet of magnet paper left. I printed the kids' pictures and the chores with the money value on them(in 25 cent increments). I had blue card stock, and cut it down to size and put the kids' pictures on top and made little button magnets to hold the bottom in place. 

The paycheck pad is something made on publisher. I used Vistaprint to print the notepad. Once it arrived in the mail, I attached magnets to the back.

We are now on week three and still going strong. The kids get to pick some of the chores to do and I delegate some as well. Saturdays are for make up work because sometimes we are gone and they don't get the chance to really make any money those days.

It is amazing how much cleaner my house is now. If you haven't started making your kids do chores, you are truly missing out....and so are they!

Summer Applique' Outfits

Summertime is in full swing around here, and boy are we busy! Between VBS, swim lessons, piano lessons(which start next week), play dates, and visiting family, there isn't a whole lot of crafting going on here lately.

I have been able to sneak in some cute little applique outfits for S.R. though:o)

She loves all of the new outfits that I have made her...thankfully!

For all of these shirts, I googled the images, and found the ones I felt would be easiest to stitch. I copied the images, pasted in Word, printed them out, and used them as the templates. 

Super quick and easy.

 Crab with coordinating shorts.

Anchor with coordinating skirt

 Butterfly with coordinating shorts

 Octopus

 Watermelon (which will have coordinating skirt)...I found this idea on Pinterest. This one is my fave!

I have received permission from E to make him some shirts, so I will share those as soon as I get them made. 

I hope you all are having a great start to your summer break!

Is perception everything? Can customer reviews change perception about a business?

It can be everything. If you Google "old town mexican cafe san diego", you will probably find better reviews than any other place. It is a tourist location hence the perceived value is higher. The food isn't anything great, neither is the service. In fact, you probably won't get good service most of the times. But overall, people seem to say that it's a great place to eat. I don't think any amount of bad reviews will change the opinion of people decide to go there because of most of them seem to think ok and some of them think it's exceptional.

The question I am trying to ask is if reviews are the only way people believe in something. It's easy to answer- NO. Google reviews are only a guidance for people who are searching. Reviews can tell if something is horribly wrong with a business, or if something is truly exceptional about a business. All the other experiences might tell you details which might be biased. There is no real number to define if reviews can change perception about a business. Reviews might bring first time customers, but overall perception about a business differentiates the best and places which are perceived to be the best.

Try searching for desserts and look up the reviews of a places, you will be surprised how good reviews are and how many people write reviews for dessert places.

Effect on Free Online Business Directories after Penguin Update 2.0

Google Update their link building algorithm again in May 2013 that is a Penguin 2.0 update. After this, the main question in webmaster’sminds, is these free online business directories effective for their businesses? Online business directories are still helpful for your online businesses because you submit your real business information in these directories. But, some free online directories are not getting nice business for your online business because they are not good directories and they are not following Google guideline to add businesses.

These types of directories are not good for your online businesses and they can harm your business and at the end Google de-index these sites. So make sure before submitting your business details and links inthese spam directories. Free online business directories are good option to promote your business locally and many potential customers come at these directories to find any services and products. So, if your business is there then they can directly contact with you. 

Listing a business or add a business information in local yellow pages directories is very important for your business growth. The main reason forrejection of your business from these directories is you can’t take it seriously. You have to submit your business in relevant category and add real details of your business service and products. You need follow proper way to submit your products and services in online directories. Add your image of products and services that you are providing, is helpful to understand your business services.  

At the end, Google gives priority to these directories that have most relevant businesses and do not add un-relevant business in their online directories. These directories also help in search engine ranking.

Chevron Summer Dress

I am chomping at the bit to start working on some summer clothes for the kids. I have permission and promises from E that he will wear what I make for him...I just have to run my ideas by him first:o) Thankfully, it's a lot easier to please S.R. As long as it's girly and comfortable, she's all in!

I got really lucky the other day while in Hobby Lobby. They NEVER, and I mean NEVER have regular chevron in stock. They usually have a few duck cloth selections, but the apparel chevron is always sold out.

It was a sign...a sign that it was my chance to make a cute dress for S.R.

And here it is. A sweet little apron dress with a ruffled bodice. She loves it, and that makes me smile.

The back is gathered and the straps button on the inside of the dress. I had so much fun creating this dress, and I am ready to start working on some more!! Time for a fabric run!!

What some of the top companies are doing to retain customers?

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/28/your-money/companies-that-get-customer-service-right.html?_r=1&

Some excerpts from the above article:

1) Philips refunded a customer after a bulb the customer bought stopped working after 5 months! Yes, when you back your sales with "Guarantees", you make sure you live up to the promises made. There is nothing more annoying for us as customers when we find out the companies used the "guarantee tactic" to lure them into a sale. I bet that the customer who got the refund has raved about Philips which got Philips amazing brand publicity and lots of customers.

2) Human Customer service with follow ups:  In the age of automation, I have met venture capitalists who cringe at the mention of human element needed to run a business. We are definitely not there yet, and like it or not, people sometimes like to talk to a business who they paid. It might be pre-sales, support or sometimes just to make sure how much they are going to be charged this month. West Elm in the above article got full points for customer service, talk about customer retention-they won customers for life.

3) Acknowledgement mistakes made and promptly correcting: We are humans, and everybody knows that, so do customers. Customer appreciate honest business, and they will always appreciate when a business accepts mistake made and does what is needed.

In case you are wondering why customer retention is such a big deal, then please refer to few pictures here http://keepcustomer.blogspot.com/2013/04/customer-retention-infographic.html