I hope everyone is enjoying this lovely holiday weekend. It is Apple Festival time here, and the fair starts next weekend. The King Apple Parade will be tomorrow afternoon, and we’ll be down there again to enjoy this uniquely small town event.
You can see my previous posts on this fun weekend with Apple Festival 2018, showing the windows in town and the vintage car show, Apple Festival 2014 featuring the various varieties of apples, and Apple Festival 2015 highlighting the apple growers, each showing a different angle of the four day event.
There used to be a quilt show with the festival, and a few years ago I entered this one. They aren’t doing it anymore, but I had to show my Farmer’s Market Quilt just one more time for my newer readers.
I want to let you all in on the plan for the coming weeks. I have been hard at work on Autumn Jubilee, and it will begin October 2. Great prizes are lined up with both returning and new vendors, and I’ll have a quilt along, several small sewing projects, crafting projects, card stamping and a wool stitch along, as well as more fun with cooking, reading and a few surprises. I changed the header photo over to Autumn as I am getting really pumped up about this event.
In the meantime, I am going to take a break from blogging for two weeks. I have scheduled the next Teacups block for September 13, a week late so this post stays on the top longer for more readers to participate in the polls below. Then I’ll be back with a new post on Sunday the 15th. In the meantime, I need your help with a couple of questions.
One of the things I need to decide is how much to do outside of creating and writing. I spend a lot of time doing extra posts and patterns for other entities to help people find my blog and get new readers and followers, which translates into more goodies for you come giveaway time. The problem is I do not know where it is most profitable to spend my time, and what I can discontinue. So, I need your help. While I am off, please answer this poll question about how you found my blog. If you are unsure, just select the option that is most likely or the way you usually find blogs to read. Click on the button for your answer, then click “vote” at the bottom of the poll. There is an option if you just cannot remember. I really need to see at least 100 responses to make it meaningful, and I do appreciate you giving me the feedback. You can also leave me any comment about this.
How Did You Find My Blog Originally?I enjoy doing blog hops but they can be a lot of work, so I need a majority of readers to help me decide if it is something I want to continue. I have to create the hop post, visit all the other blogs on the hop to leave comments, publish the links and then update them daily to permalinks. For example, if you only click on other blogs active on the day of my post, then I will want to schedule myself late in the hop so you have more to see. If you see them all, I would ask to be at the beginning so more people from the other participants will see my blog. If you don’t like them, then I might want to decrease my participation. Sometimes the statistics don’t show a lot of interaction in referrals from other blogs, or clicks on the hop blogger links. Do you like them, and click on the other blogger posts on the hop? Do you come back later to see the blogs later than my post? Choose an answer and click “vote”. You can leave a comment about this too if you like.
Do You Enjoy Blog Hops?Thank you for taking the time to answer these two questions! It will really help me determine what you, the readers, want to see so I can bring you more of what you like.
One more thing I am considering is changing the pages at the top to combine into fewer ones, or changing them to drop down menus with just general categories showing to reduce the size of the header. Dropping some pages altogether might be an option as the categories on the sidebar pull up the same info, although not with pictures. Are the pictures important for the pages, or would simple text links be enough? I could show Quilting on the top, with drop downs for Projects, Basics, Fixing Problems. What do you think of that? Would it make things just as easy to find or be a pain?
For the next two weeks, I hope you’ll come back to just play and explore on the blog, shop my affiliate sponsors, and use the categories on the sidebar to see posts you might have missed on subjects you are interested in seeing. I have over 1000 posts now, so lots to see, free patterns to download, cards to make, tables to set, recipes to print, and more!! Leave comments on the questions from today’s post, but I will not be personally answering those while I am off. I will read and do appreciate each and every one. Share your projects in our Facebook Sharing Group. If you haven’t joined yet, be sure to answer the questions or the moderators may not approve you.
Thank you to everyone that uses my affiliate links when you are shopping. It helps to pay my costs for the blog and shipping expense for prizes so I can bring you more free patterns, mystery quilt alongs and fun. Here are some of the latest bargains from my affiliate sponsors –
Holiday Weekend Sale 25% Off all Stamps at Impression Obsession, use code LABOR at checkout! Sale ends Monday, Sept 2 at midnight. Super fun sets including some for upcoming holidays, like Halloween and Christmas, and my favorite Thanksgiving along with those for year round use like Birthdays and Patriotic themes. Get some great sentiment stamps for the next Safelight project, coming next April. After Monday, just click on the sale button on their sidebar for great bargains on clearance!
Make Star Quilts with this book from CT Publishing, my newest affiliate. Read mysteries with a quilting theme including patterns with the Quilting Cozy series from Carol Dean Jones. Download the free Gem Ornament crafting project too!
40% Off Kits, Fabric, Yarn & Supplies on Bluprint this weekend. Summer may be ending, but you can keep crafting all year long with 40% off all kits, fabric, yarn & supplies sitewide! Save this Labor Day with code: LABORDAY40, sale ends Monday. Bluprint is also offering a 30 Day Trial for just $1 to check out all the videos you can watch in a month! See the own forever DVDs on Sale and Handpicked Favorites under $15! Deals and Steals on Clearance, too!
Check out the Amazon Prime Special, Amazon Audible 30 day trial + 2 free books, Deep Discounts on Kitchen Items, and trade in your old Kindle for the new Kindle for 25% off and a Gift Card equal to the value of your trade in. Then take a look at the Kindle Unlimited Program. Shop the Amazon Outlet for deep discounts on overstocked and discontinued items. Give a Gift of Audible to friend or family, and choose the day they receive it, you can do some holiday or birthday shopping this weekend and give it when you say!
See you soon!!
Note – first time comments are held for moderation, so if you’ve never commented before it won’t show right away. I’ll approve all of those when I return to blogging. If you’ve commented in the past, yours will post immediately.