Why Percieved Value is worth looking into before you buy.

I love the Bare Necessity song from Jungle book- When you find that you can go along without thinking about it- I'll tell you something true- The Bare Necessities of Life will come to you.

Perceived Value. Let's talk real for a second. Perceived Value is something not to gloss over when you are going to purchase a big item or something that you have been saving your money for. 

The financial gurus at Investopedia would say This:

In marketing terminology, perceived value is the customers' evaluation of the merits of a product or service and its ability to meet their needs and expectations, especially in comparison with its peers.

Marketing professionals try to influence consumers' perceived value of a product by describing the attributes that make it superior to the competition.

Things are not always what they seem when perceived value comes into play: In a very real sense- Things are valuable by the way we view things. That is why there is competition in the piece of the pie for your hard earn dollar.

Here is a great example of what perceived value:

Let's take Serius XM- the Radio service that I love. ( I love having it in my car, and online.)

We got a new vehicle and it came with Sirius XM. I love free things, like the regular radio that I get free, But I saw value in Sirius XM after our free trial.

Why? Because for only $13 a month- a Price of a couple cups of coffee or hot chocolate per month I wouldn't have to listen to all those commercials, and I get to cherry-pick what I listen too.

They Marketed it as a being able to get all these channels, and don't miss your favorite baseball game! Okay- you got me!

So that $13 a month subscription didn't seem like a big deal, but then when you do the math it's over $ 150 ($156) to be exact, They advertise it at $8 a month, but with the luxury tax it comes out to be $13 a month. Geez! 

I can I spend my money a bit better, Maybe- But for me having Kid's Place Live, No Shoes Radio, The Garth Channel,  and the Beatles Channel, It's awesome! I can't live without it now.

Einstein famously said "It's all relative", and we see that pricing is no different - we just need something to make it relative to.

 Check out this other Case study about perceive value from Ninja Outreach

So getting to the root as to why I am writing this article.

A discussion between my husband and I have been: 

When and how to go back to Disney?

 Do we stay at Disney World or do we stay off "campus"

 Do we buy into Disney Vacation Club?

 This conversation has been going on for months. We are to the point that we all want to go back to Disney as fast as possible. I have a Whatever it takes attitude to get back to the Magic Kingdom. AS FAST AS I CAN! 

So after a good long week of talking about should, we or shouldn't we do DVC We came across this article that really talks about the perceived value that DVC offers.

DVC Fan mentions Perceived Value as Pixie Dust- so clever how Disney does that right?

 I encourage people in the strongest sense of the word to do their homework if they plan to finance. Look at it from all angles while doing your best to remove pixie-dust from the equation. Pixie dust is only allowed in if the monthly payments of financing a DVC contract do not present a hardship. If you have to give up other things, if you have scale back on your lifestyle or any meaningful necessities, then perhaps it’s not the right choice. 

 He also argues that not all luxury Items like Vacationing at Disney through Disney's Vacation Club is a luxury item, It's all in how you perceive your time and money, and what it's worth. Click here for here the whole article 

If your hobby is to plan a Disney vacation and go to Disney- and that is how you want to spend your hard earn money then the perceived value for you- is in a positive light. Some friends and family would think your crazy for spending that much money on a vacation. (I agree it's a ton of money) However I love, & My family loves everything, Disney, so for us, it's a no brainer to go to Disney as soon as we can. (it's our hobby) and everyone needs some kind of Hobby to keep you sane. Here is a great article as to why we all need some kind of hobby in our life! 

As of today, we haven't decided if we are going to go with DVC, Were still trying to decide if we want to spend our money on this.  (I don't think we will finance DVC if we can make it work.) 

What luxury item do you feel is worth every penny? 

Why paper flowers are the new way to give flowers

I just completed my first ever custom order for paper flowers, and I am feeling pretty good about myself and my talent of making the paper look amazing.

While making this order my thoughts were turned to why are paper flowers a thing? and more importantly why give paper flowers?

Why is paper flowers a thing?

I believe that there are a maker and creative movement going on. Our world is all about creating When you get some amazing artists that turn ordinary objects (paper) into something stunning (flowers.)  Of course, that is what is going to go mainstream, now, years later this art form has become a beautiful artform to have paper flowers.

As a little girl I would make flowers out of cupcake liners, and tissue paper, ribbon, and even leaves, I was creating my own little happy floral shop as a child. I loved creating with what I had. Paper flowers are a beautiful art form that truly can last for a long time.

knowing that you can custom any flower to any color, any size, you may find yourself asking a paper artist/crafter to make you some flowers you have only dreamed about.

Maybe your loved one is in ICU in the hospital and you need some hope... Paper flowers are allowed to be in the room, unlike real flowers they allow paper flowers.

True story: I learned that real flower bouquets are beautiful for your daughter's dance recital until they wilt and die a couple days later, with crocodile tears and a sad daughter when you throw away the flowers, you think there has got to be a better way to remember her recital... Paper flowers are the answer!

Got a graduate that loves colors that are not quite traditional that you can get at the florist? Yup, I bet there is a paper in that color, and oh yeah I got that hot orange Iris covered... Just saying the possibilities are endless! You can have a lot of fun with paper flower bouquets!

Maybe you just want a special gift for your friend that you can't get at a store, a paper flower can me customized to the color, size, type of flower(s) If you can dream it you can make it!


Paper flowers are so much fun to make and to learn, for me The process is therapeutic, it calms my souls and makes my heart happy!

This will be a perfect mother's day gift, I love paper flowers because you can make them as interesting as the person that is getting them and I really find that these flowers can be designed to have a timeless feel.


 I love the simplistic white and yellow color pallet!

My design tip for simplistic flowers or design, do something subtle in the design process to add an element of wow, for example, my white daisies, I could have done just white card stock, instead, I used a white paper with a small off-white pattern, so the flowers have a bit of texture. Just a small change can really change your project to wow to Amazing!

Happy Creating! and Happy Mother's day!

Three toned Inlay Card that will say I love you with out you saying anything!

Playing with paper is my happiness, so it's no surprise that I came up with this background for a fun valentine's day card.

I cut out 3 backgrounds of hearts, then inlay them in totally random spots. If I thought it needed to be a white heart, or pink heart or dark pink heart that's where it went. It turned out awesome!

of course, I added a  die-cut tag with some extra glitter.

So I am curious, do you give your kids a valentine day gift? I made a candy bouquet last year and they loved it... but this year I am not feeling it much... Although I think it would be fun to make something in the kitchen like cupcakes or candy together and then eat it!

What traditions do you do on Valentines Day?

Staycation during Christmas Break

My amazing husband took off the week in between Christmas and New Years to spend time with us, we don't usually plan on a trip out of town, it's a staycation and we loved this week!

Is it just me? The fact that Christmas is filled with lots of emotions, food, and things, that you just need at least two days to get back to normal. I feel like it's been two long days to get the house back to the pre-Thanksgiving day. We got Christmas packed up, now it's time to play!

Our family does staycations on the light side of things. I really think that kids don't really care as much about what we do, as long as they get to do it with mom and dad, and together is even better.

Here have been some of our activities that we have done during our staycation:

Build an awesome train track
Build roads and cities using Go Go Smart Wheels, blocks, lego's the sky's the limit.
Go see a matinee kid movie at local theater
have a couple movie nights (it's time to introduce Indiana Jones to the kiddos)
a trip to the Science Center
Play date with cousins and a trip to local Chick-Fill-A to play
Playing kid games like Pie Face. Connect Four, Bug Jenga
Nerf Gun Wars with daddy, and cousins
Story festival (read like 10 stories on the couch in one sitting)
playing in the kitchen with mom, and her new toy(s) precision cooking (sous vide)
And because we can, watch lots of Disney World youtube videos!

playing a freeze game

Most of all of these are simply easy ways to build family memories, sometimes as a family, we are pulled in so many different directions that we need a staycation to just have time to cultivate relationships that need to be stronger. I know this past week my son would come up to me for no particular reason and hug me and say I love you, mom. If we are too busy, we will miss those impromptu moments that fill our lives with the joy we are seeking. I am grateful for this time that we can spend as a family and learn and grow together, laugh and have hearts melted, isn't that what's Christmas is all about!

We had to organize our train tracks, glad we did now they can't get enough time to play with trains!

Happy New Years and enjoy those little moments!

Christmas Baking day 2016

What is it about the beloved baking day we all get giddy about every year about this time? I was able to bake in my kitchen that I love with my sister in-law, in which she is awesome we got a ton of stuff done in the 4 hours she was here, no messing around...

So here was what was on the agenda?

 

Honey Caramel

Peanut Brittle

Peppermint Bark snowflakes

Tiger Bark

Ranch Chex mix

I then packaged them into cute boxes made from my Silhouette to give away to family... it was a fun day and I was exhausted at the end of the day! Totally worth the whirl wind of creating in the kitchen! I can't wait till next year. 

I think that it went well, we knew what we wanted to do ahead of time and we knew what each other was doing, a lot of the time, one would be string, cooking, measuring, while the other one did dishes, or got the next step in the recipe ready to go, so it really worked out well.  

Home Made Chocolate Covered Cherries (that's worth the wait!)

These are the best cordial, or chocolate covered cherries you will have... and they are easy and therapeutic to make!

For last week's artist's date I chose to make some chocolate covered cherries, I researched the best methods, or the way I wanted to do them, and recipes and found this tutorial helpful from my favorite source, YouTube, cheek it out!

My biggest hurdle for making these have always been that I couldn't eat them right away... I had to wait a whole week, seriously that's like a lifetime away I don't have patience! It was totally worth the wait and they are so good!!!

Cordial Cherries have always been on my"list" for years, so I thought why not? Cherries and sugar aren't that expensive, and I will know right away if it doesn't work out... so no pressure right? I am glad I took this challenge, They are so good! I estimated that with the chocolate and the cherries and sugar I spent about $8-$10 on materials... (so getting at least lest 60 cherries for $10, isn't too bad, and they are really yummy!) So really a decent frugal/economic handmade gift that the receiver would like! Now, as for my labor, it was expensive! We're not counting the time I spent, it's the process right?

I will say that it took longer than I thought it would, I dedicated a whole morning to making these things, and it took me into the afternoon. I do think that next time I will change somethings like having the fondant already to do before I start, would help, that really only took like 5 minutes to make, but I thought it needed to rest and be chilled a bit so it was easier to wrap around the cherry. I also would work in chunks, so do a third,  to get it into the fridge, so by the time I was done with the last cherry to get fondant on in, I could start on the first batch that go put into the fridge to dip the covered sugar cherry into chocolate. The whole process lasted about 4 hours, I think I could cut that down to about 3 hours, now that I have done a batch. It would also help if you didn't have little hands that also wanted to help... I love that my kids are in the kitchen with me, but this recipe was more of a repetitious thing, and having kids in the kitchen with you didn't make it much therapeutic... which is why I was doing this in the first place.

Here's the recipe, I adapted a bit from Laurice's Kitchen

Cherry Cordials
60-90 large maraschino cherries, stems attached, drained (I used a jar from Sams club, and used about half)
12-24 ounces semi sweet chocolate chips
1 cup sweetened condensed milk (not evaporated milk), 237ml 
1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon light corn syrup, 20ml
½ teaspoon almond extract, 2ml, or a splash if you don't like to measure like me...
4-6 cups confection sugar (powdered sugar), approximately 454 grams plus additional if needed ( needed a bit more.)

Mix the milk, corn syrup, extract and powdered sugar, by hand/mixer, until it resembles clay. Do not over mix, but more powdered sugar can be added if the mixture is too soft to handle.
Flatten a teaspoon of the sugar mixture into a thin disk and cover the maraschino cherry, pressing to seal the “clay” around the stem. Set cherries aside on a baking sheet covered with parchment paper. If the clay separates from the cherries, pat the cherries dry.

Melt the semi sweet chocolate in the top of a double boiler until everything is smooth and melted.
Dip each sugar-covered cherry in the candy covering slightly onto the stem to ensure the sugar is completely covered and allow the excess to drip off for a few seconds. Place each covered cherry in a small candy baking cup. Store the cherries in a sealed container for a week. Enjoy after the long wait!

If you have any questions on how I did it, comment bellow, and Happy creating!

My Cookie Exchange Cookie I shared

Lets face it, in life it's all about the cookie... right? This year I was invited to a cookie exchange, I love them! We all have grand plans to NOT EAT THE COOKIES and give them away in nice little plates to friends and neighbors right? I will freeze my cookies until Christmas Eve when we have a family game night. (by that time my kitchen mojo is in hiding, and I can't get her to do a thing.)

So I thought about what I wanted to do and then what time allowed me to do, and I kept coming back to cake mix cookies. But how do you dress up cake mix cookies so they look festive? with a big grin on my face I came up with a brilliant plan. I am sure it's been done before but no where have I seen it done the way I did it... so let me walk you through the process. 

Chocolate Mint cake mix cookies

for the topping: 

1 can chocolate frosting, I used Pillsbury, but any will work.

1 box of Andes Mints

melt the Andes Mints, add the frosting, melt that, you don't want to over melt it to much then it will become more like a syrup, you want your mixture to hold it's shape a bit. Pour the mixture onto a piece of parchment paper. ( I also think it would work as fudge, but it in a brownie pan, let it cool) Sprinkle Candy Cane Crunch on to the wet chocolate mixture. let it cool and set up, (2 hours or so.)

Once the chocolate mixture is set up, cut it up into about 1 inch or so squares. 

Making the cake mix cookies is the easy part, I followed this recipe  but I didn't put in chocolate chips. (I'm sorta weird.) 

You will need 2 eggs, oil, water. mix, and bake...

Once they were out of the oven, I placed a square of chocolate mint on the cookie, then transferred them to the cooling rack. 

On a different note: If putting the chocolate candy square on the cookie doesn't seem like something you would do, you could melt the mint chocolate mixture after the cookies have been baking and then dip the top of the cookie in the melted chocolate mixture, then add the Candy Cane Crunch. That would be a cookie that is worth giving to a cookie exchange too! 

I know I am not the only one that has came up with some fun toppings for cookies, do you have one that you love? I would love to hear from you, leave a comment bellow! Happy Baking! 

Santa's Visit

I love how when I am walking and thinking about my next shindig I plan for my kids, how a budding Idea can become reality, this was the case for me while walking early November, I thought how can I get Santa to come to our house, with a bit of Christmas Cheer I made it happen!

We kept it light, I wanted it to be magical for my kids, and test the waters to see if I could pull off breakfast with Santa, I did! It was just our family, Santa brought a gift for each of the kids, and we sent him on his way with Waffles and Bacon and a plate of cookies. A perfect start to a perfect day!

The How: I asked a friend that my kids didn't know that well, He even had a Santa Suit,( I also had one, it's stored in our attic. I got the Santa suit for like $10 at a garage sale) I knew that most Saturday are busy so I wanted it to be early in the morning, so we chose for 8:30 am. Santa couldn't eat with us, so we gave some food to him before he left,

I told my daughter that I got a text for the North Pole that morning, that said that Santa is gong to be in our area and he wants to stop by to make sure they were being good... So Miss Thing had to wear her Santa Dress.

There is magic in the air when Santa shows up, something about feeling happy and peaceful there isn't a feeling in the world that can describe the feeling of wow! Santa came to visit us!


I think I may have started a new tradition for our family... lets see if it continues for the years to follow!

Christmas tree scene with stencils

I secretly have a thing for Christmas trees and stencils.  I had a blast coming up with different ways to use one stencil, I called it my personal design challenge... I really liked the way they turned out!

The stencil is Evergreen Grove from Elizabeth Crafts  I got it from Memory Bounds in Ankeny Iowa and I loved playing with this stencil!

Here are some of the examples...
For the first one, I inked white vellum waited it to dry, dribbled water on it to get a neat look, then let it dry, then I then applied gesso to the stencil, then coated the wet gesso with white glitter to the trees! I added a white glitter  to the dear, and some decorative silver tape at the bottom.

For the second one, I used a "dry brush" with all Kuretake watercolor, (and started adding pigment in) then I let it dry, and added more and less water until I got the look I was looking for, no extra tools, just the stencil brush, water, and two shades of greens! Then once that was dry, I went in with a medium yellow and painted a wash for a background. The trick with this technique is to use just the right water and pigment. I then added some highlights to the branches with some yellow gold from the Starry color collection.  At the bottom I just used a flooding technique to add some texture to the piece. I added two layers of paper for the mat of his painting, and some gold decorative tape from Hobby Lobby to anchor the card a bit more. 

This one I wanted to use a more traditional winter scene, it's going to a college and I didn't want to make it super cute. It was simple, I used green texture embossing paste on the stencil, then once that was dry I painted the clouds. (I finally figured out how to make realistic clouds, so I had to do some on this project!) I then glazed over the whole card with some White gold Starry Color to give it some shimmer.

This one was a fun one, its called a Batik technique, in a really easy way of explaining: It's a two step process, first, you ink the back side of the stencil with ink, (I used watercolor pigment) you will want two diffrent colors so they can blend and mix well.  Lay the stencil inked side down on the paper, and let it dry.... do not do anything to it, I have to walk away for an hour because I want to mess with it or look at the process. 

 Once the ink is dry, you can ink the stencil part with what ever color you think will work well... I chose a lighter ink color to make the trees stand out. This effect is really easy, but takes time, and practice, if you colors don't blend well you get a muddy look, so knowing color theory really helps! 

I used a Lori Whitlock Step card Silhouette File for the card base. 

What do you think? Did you know you could make a bunch of different cards with one stencil? it's fun and I love using one tool for lots of different looks.  stencils let you do that! Which card is your favorite? Do you have a stencil that is your go too? Leave a comment bellow, and Happy Creating!

Quick Washi Tape Christmas Cards

Need that last minute Christmas card done like now? look no farther than your Silhoute software (free program even if you don't own a Silhouette) a color printer with card stock ready to go, and washi tape

I used a free Merry Christmas file from the Silhouette Design store, printed it on to card-stock as a the base for my card. I already had the Christmas Trees cut out from a previous card I did. (used the negative part, left the positive part for this project.)  Once the sentiment is printed and the base card is cut to size add your favorite Christmas type washi tape to it as a background, and then add your embellishment (white tree) onto the washi tape back ground you created, and you whipped up a card in like 5 min. Super awesome right? I suppose you could stamp a sentiment too, but I realized why stamp sentiments?

For a non software/printer card, you can still make a cute card, in even less time.. you just need some washi tape, a printed sentiment (usually from a sticker or from a paper pack to help with layers.) 

The key to this is to plan where you want the washi tape at, do you plan on using the whole card base and use washi tape as more of a pattern that is part of the card, or just a couple lines of tape at the bottom?

 I actually sat down on a Saturday afternoon and just played with some washi tape, with out an image/sentiment in mind and just played with the washi tape, but if you are a planner, you could have your printed sentiments out and decide how it would work out. I just love the freedom of playing with your paper crafting supplies,  and seeing what comes from just playing around. 

Keep like colors together, and use the golden design rules when it comes to using washi tape. For example: Use the rules of thirds, a small, medium and large pattern goes well. 

So there you have it some easy last minute card ideas, I suppose these would also work for tags too, if you wanted too. 

I really think that if you were to go out and buy 3 rolls of washi tape, and use your printer for a sentiment, buy some specialty paper that you can cut the sentiments out. I estimate you could get about 50 cards for about $10, which is really not bad!  

Snowman toddler activity

Need a good decoration that a toddler can do? Look no farther! This kept my toddler busy and happy for about 10 minutes, which really is saying something. Best thing about it, is it was free, I used an Ice (brand) bottle, Cotton balls, a small corner of orange card-stock, and a black sharpie to mark the eyes, mouth, and buttons on the bottle.

This was the setup, and prep before you start this activity with your toddler

The end result, it's pretty cute, and the process is worth it!

Paper Nativity

I love handmade nativities, so when I saw this nativity file from Carina Gardner. I thought this would be a great paper project for a cold morning. So it was, it was a fun easy project to put together. I  used some two tone brown paper for each shadow box with some white and black paper for the accent colors. The project came together quickly, which was a blessing this time of year, I have a ton of projects to do and not enough time to do them so this was a great project to "whip up"
It's a tradition that we display a handmade nativity (partly because I can't see spending money on a nativity when I can "make" one.

To give you a run down of some of the notes that helped me as I went, it's going to take about 2 12x12 sheets for each shadow box.

I bought four of the five shadow box files that she has, I opened them all up in one document on the Silhouette Design software, un-grouped everything, and then grouped all the white pieces together, and all the black pieces together for easier cutting.

I assembled the shadow boxes and I did glued the taps by the slits on the box.