To diffuse the flash cut out a piece of milk jug and tape to your flash. This will help reduce the pet eye problems. Also as stated you need more of a color difference between your subject and background.
I agree with what everyone else is saying. Also, I would try to blur the background a bit and see if that might help. You could lighten it while your at it.
I would also clean up the dust crumb's on the floor, and clone out that little tiny hair thing in picture #1, it's just a little distracting.
Way to go with the low PoV. IMO, if possible on both, a much larger aperture, to blur the background.
The on-board flash is a problem. The background is competing with the subject. The vertical of the cabinet in #1 is awful. If rotated, the main subject suffers. Perhaps a tighter crop or another shot (w/o the flash).