Our Own Felt Chore Chart

Contribution by Kennith Griffin

I thought it was so funny a few weeks ago when my daughter came home talking about a play date that she had at one of her friends' house. She was telling me about all the things that their family had in their house, including a chore chart. She thought it was so neat that they had a chore chart and wanted for us to make one. I thought it was too good to be true and told her I'd make one, which would mean that she had chores to do.

I decided to jump on that as soon as possible and make one. So I went online with our ISP to find some directions on how to make one. I found some to make a felt one that sounded really easy so I decided to go with that one.

My DIY felt chore chart turned out really well and my daughter was still surprised about it when I was through making it. I'm curious as to how long her excitement about doing chores will last.

MI was compensated by my friends at WildBlue.com for this guest post.

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#5 Laws of Advertising

Who is in your market? What type of person do you target for your business?

Knowing your market is vital to the success of your business. Let's think about this for a moment...

Would you market golf balls to new mothers?

Would you market cloth diapers to deep sea divers?

Would you market paperback books to the blind?

Look at your product. Does the general population know that they need your product? Catch the wording...Do they know they need your product? This knowledge can result in two actions.

1. You market your product to the right audience, the general audience sees it and then buys it
2. You are a fantastic sales person and are able to convince the audience that the product is worth buying (example: the Pet Rock)

First step in advertising is to learn and know your product inside out, upside down and backwards. Here are a few questions to ask yourself about your product:

• What is it?
• What is it made of?
• How does it work?
• What is required to make it work?
• What are the dangers and precautions?
• Why do I need it?
• How will it improve my life?
• Why should I buy it from you?
• Why is it better than another product?
• How much does it cost?
• Where can I buy it?
• Can I buy it online?
• How much is shipping?
• Can I return it hassle free?
• Can I get my money back quickly?
• If I need help, how do I contact Customer Service?

When asking these questions, try to think of yourself as the customer. What kind of answers would you want to hear if you were being approached with this product?

Next, think of the people that make up the audience:

• Who is your target market?
• What is their age?
• What is their gender?
• What is their station in life (mother, widow, child)?
• What is the income of your market?

Will you need to change any of the answers to your product question based on the target audience questions? Thinking about the audience will help direct your answers to all the product questions. It is important for businesses to design their online sites with the target audience in mind. Not only should the graphics, color, font and navigation be applicable to the product, but it also must be directed towards the target audience. You must appeal to the senses of the people you want to buy your product.

Always keep your target audience in mind not only when choosing a product, but also throughout the entire selling process be it face-to-face or online.

The audience is the key.

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Sending Out Christmas Cards Early

Guest post written by Abigail Truman

One of the things that comes with preparing for Thanksgiving is getting our Christmas cards ready to send to friends and family. I always like to put them in the mail the Monday after Thanksgiving so that I at least have that huge Christmas responsibility out of the way.

This year though, I thought about sending out some DIY cards instead of just some store-bought ones. So I went online to figure out how much trouble DIY-ing cards would take me. As I was getting some ideas online, I ran across this website www.clearwirewimax4g.com/clearwire_coverage_maps.html and decided to sign up for one of the internet packages that were featured on it.

Well, in the end I decided to send out DIY holiday cards and got to work on them at the beginning of November. I actually got all of them made in time for addressing and stuffing them in envelopes before Thanksgiving and had them ready to mail out on the Monday afterward. I'm not sure that I saved much money by making instead of buying them, but I had a lot of fun doing it.







MI was compensated by my friends at Clearwire for this guest post.

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Blue Sky Scrubs and Crafting

Sometimes I'm a very messy crafter and I usually have to wear an ugly old shirt to protect my clothing. I'm here to tell you that there is an alternative!

There is an alternative. Wear nursing scrubs when making your crafts! They come in so many different colors! You will find them to be extremely comfortable and easy to clean. They are so versatile and you won't have to worry about messing up your other clothes.

Cheap scrubs from Blue Sky Scrubs can be thrown in the wash and dried in the dryer. It doesn't get better than that and you know it if you wash as many loads of laundry as I do.

Scrub clothing is really the way to go. I was thinking about all the money I would save because I tend to splatter paint and get glue stuck where it isn't supposed to be - namely, my clothes! I'm ready to jump over and buy the Original Scrubs because they are not only inexpensive, but they also look great with...:

• stitching on both back pockets of the scrub bottoms
  
• stitching on the pocket of the scrub top
• scrub pants are between a flare-leg and a boot-cut
• scrub tops are tapered at the waist

Obviously, they are cute and I also love the family all dressed alike. I love the uniformity of it all especially since I can throw them all in the same load of clothes. The scrub tops and scrub pants would obviously be comfortable to work in if you are in the medical field, but I think a pair or two should be a staple when you craft. Since I always did crafts with the my daughter and niece, I would have just loved having them wear the Blue Sky Scrubs for kids and I'm sure they would have loved them too. The fabric can take the rough and tumble of children too, so think of all the money I could have saved!

A rather fun item at Blue Sky Scrubs are the fashion-forward scrub hats and scrub caps for women. They carry three different hats:

The patented Pony scrub hat®

I wish that when Alyssa was splatter painting, we had the Pony scrub hat® to protect her hair from all the paint. Currently, this hat can be purchased in hundreds of colors and designs

The Pixie scrub hat®

The Poppy scrub hat™

Scrubs are no longer ugly, boring uniforms. Instead, they are a fashionable and stylish alternative for casual wear during many activities spanning from crafting to nursing to sleeping in them as pajamas.

I'm hooked on comfort and scrubs rank high on the comfort scale!

My opinions are valued and I was compensated by my friends at Blue Sky Scrubs for this post.

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