Photo Challenge – Are You In?
You might remember that in January, Matthew dropped my hard drive.
It crashed.
Literally to the ground and literally as in I couldn’t read a single thing on it. (I’ll be writing soon about how the amazing Gillware recovered 93% of the files!!)
You can bet your bottom dollar I am more committed than ever to getting photos printed, developed, backed-up, etc.
Periodically I am going to post challenges here on The Mom Creative to encourage YOU AND ME to do something with our photos.
Today’s challenge – go make an 8×10 photo canvas.
These suckers take less than 10 minutes from start to finish and the best part – they are free (just pay shipping).
I have canvases all over the place. Some of them I rotate (ie: Valentine’s pictures just go up for February) while others are all over our home.
I made one of this photo. It was taken almost a year ago and it still makes my heart so happy.
If you don’t have a need for a canvas in your home, then make one for a Mother’s Day gift (it will be here before you know it). Don’t procrastinate. Don’t say, eh, I’ll do it later.
Do it now.
You will be so delighted when it arrives in the mail.
I hope you’ll join me in this challenge to do something with our photos. Life is busy, but living with our photos is such a blessing.
Be sure to share what canvas you made!
Thanks for the reminder to display our favorite photos! I absolutely adore this family photo!
Thank you!! I needed the reminder myself. 🙂
I’m a long time fan of you and your blog… but have to say that I cringe at how often you promote things that you get kick backs from. I don’t mean to be disrespectful or harsh – but this ‘challenge’ especially bothers me because it’s clear you get a kick back from every photo canvas people order from the link. I know so many people are on budgets and when you tempt people in such a strong way (“Do it now”) and under the premise of wanting to help people preserve their memories… I just have to wonder if you would promote/encourage something as strongly if you weren’t making money from it.
Again – I really don’t intend for this to sound harsh – but I read a LOT of blogs and yours is the only one that seems to almost exclusively post about and promote things that have ‘compensated links’ attached. I always feel bad for people reading your blog who are on tight budgets but are tempted by your strong marketing to buy things that they might not really need/be able to afford… or also realize that each time you encourage them to buy something, there’s something in it for you as well.
Just something you might want to think about and maybe try to find a way to balance in future posts.
Hey Marlene, first off, thank you for reading The Mom Creative. You have no idea how thankful I am for long-time readers like you.
Let me totally honest with you.
Most bloggers get “kick-backs” from the links they put on their sites. FTC regulations state that bloggers are supposed to clearly disclose when links are compensated within a post, but sadly, I notice that many bloggers do not do this. (Sometimes they will say somewhere, like on an about page that they use affiliate links, but the FTC would say that is not transparent enough.) The kick-backs are small. For instance, when I link to books that I love, I make a 6% commission from Amazon. That works out to pennies on the dollar.
So my bet is that you are in fact reading other blogs that are using affiliate links, they just aren’t being transparent about it.
I invest many, many hours into The Mom Creative and the modest income that it generates makes it so that is helps my family and makes the time trade off worth it.
No one is forcing you, or any other reader, to click and purchase anything that I link to. I am very, very selective about what I link to. I only write about things that I am passionate about and that my family regularly uses.
I receive emails from readers every week thanking me for helping them save money, create meaningful things for their homes and their loved ones and/or find a great product.
Balance is something I am constantly thinking about. That said, I’m not going to not use an non-affiliate link over an affiliate link when one is available. It doesn’t make good business sense.
If you have read this blog for any length of time then I hope you know I genuinely do hope to inspire people to preserve memories. And I promise you, I would say do it now regardless of if I was making money off the post. This canvas deal hasn’t been available for awhile and I was excited it was back, which is why I made it the first in the series. If it’s not for you, feel free to watch for others in the future.
Marlene,
I just wanted to say that Jessica is right. Most blogs that take the time to link to a product are using affiliate links. I follow three blogs regularly. All three use affiliate links. I don’t always take advantage of every deal that Jessica posts, but I am going to use this one for a nice yet cheap birthday gift for my sister. I am personally happy that Jessica takes the time to find and share deals because I do not have the time to do it myself.
There’s nothing better than having pictures of those you love all around you! Thanks for sharing this!
Jessica,
Please forgive me but my heart is aching for you and as your real life friend I hope you don’t mind if I say something; I’m posting it as a comment but I understand if you’d like to delete it.
Criticism can be constructive but it can also wound; if any of your readers see this, I hope they understand the BEST way to communicate their opinion/suggestion/criticism to a writer, it should be by PRIVATE MESSAGE or email–NOT as a public comment. Recently a reader left the identical comment at two sites I write for (neither my personal blog); something that embarrassed me despite her VERY heartfelt opinion on the matter in question (which had NOTHING to do with either post she commented to. I have my email address publicly displayed on my blog.
I appreciated her honesty and opinion but I was extremely offended by her method.
Obviously, I’m writing in response to the comment in this thread (and I would write an email if I had access to hers); I’m sure (knowing you) you took her concern to heart and I applaud your kind explanation. I happen to know you DO consider the BEST DEALS for your readers and that sometimes you even use links that save them MORE money when you could use a different link and make more yourself!
So. This has nothing to do with your post and maybe no one else will ever read it; but I wanted to clearly explain a better way of addressing a concern rather than by attacking a blogger in her comment thread (even if done graciously, it still hurts). You charge nothing for your blog posts, they DO take time to write, and the compensation you make pales in comparison to the delight you have in sharing what you’ve learned and how to save a little in the process.
xo
You are so sweet, Robin. I know you know how words can hurt, even if well-intended. And yes, my email can easily be found on my about page.
Three cheers for saving folks a little money and discovering wonderful things in the process. 🙂 xoxo
I am in for the challenge! I have 5 years of pictures only stored on a computer and have made it a new years resolution to get the pictures out of the computer and into albums (I am doing project life).
So I ordered an 8×10 on shutterfly today that I had a special on as I have the perfect frame for it 🙂 It is a photo I have loved from 2010 and never printed!
Thanks for the reminder to preserve our memories!
Good for you, Nicole! I just spray painted a frame that I have had in storage for FIVE years. Time to get it up. 🙂 Happy you found a good deal and are up for the challenge.
thank you :). just made one of our valentine pic.!
I always tell people to print out, back-up, upload photos anywhere and all the time. You never know when you are going to loose them. I always want to print mine out but I am a few years (5 years) behind so I don’t have that money but one day. Anyways, I think I will join you in your photo challenge. Can’t wait to see what else you have in store.
Thank you so much for this challenge (although, why I should need a challenge to do something I’ve been wanting to do is a whole other story). I decided to get a canvas done of my son and I when we arrived at the airport, returning from China where we had adopted him. It was Christmas Eve and the photo our friend took is a beautiful reminder of the VERY BEST Christmas present!
Such fab advice.
For Christmas presents this year – we had prints from last year developed onto canvas. They look fab in my living room, and I hope to change 1 each year. 🙂
Hello Jessica… I must throw my 2 cents in on this post. I rarely ever make comments on blogs because I try not to read them, but I am probably in the majority of those that are thankful when you remind us or tell us of the great deals that you know about. In this day and age, we must do whatever we need to do to help raise our family and blogging seems to be a relatively easy thing to do.
So, thank you for the deals. I have participated in some – not all as my budget allows but love these canvases. I plan on doing one for my mother for mother’s day.
Love your blog, so thank you for taking time from your family to help mine. God bless.
Thanks Jessica, I just ordered a canvas to match one I had previously ordered. I have been waiting for the 8×10 canvas special to come back so that I could purchase the complimentary picture! Excited to put these on the wall.