May Sneak Peek Week: Day #5

We've got two sneak peeks for you today. Our first "peek" shows you the final line in the May Flavors of the Month Kit. Brought to you by designer, Jana Eubank, this layout features the brand new BasicGrey Mon Ami product line by Kelly Purkey. LOVE THIS!

And our second "peek" gives you the second line in the May Doubleshot Kit. Brought to you by designer, Tamara Jensen and taken from the manufacturer's blog, can you name the new line?

Yesterday's line, coming in the May Doubleshot Kit, was Pink Paislee Hello Sunshine. Be sure to watch the website tonight for the full reveal of all of the May Kits!

National Scrapbooking Day BIG CLEARANCE SALE! 50% Off on almost everything in our TSR Store!

We're celebrating National Scrapbooking Day this year with a BIG CLEARANCE SALE, going on from now through the big day, May 3rd! You'll save 50% on EVERYTHING* priced over $5.00 in our ScrapRoom Store!

*YES! This sale includes all previous club kits (FOTM Kits, Doubleshot Kits, Embellishment Kits, Project Life Kits, Patterned Paper Kits and Stamp Kits) as well as all individual layout kits, bonus kits, singleshot kits, staples and coordinating items priced over $5.00. EVERYTHING* over $5.00 will be discounted by an additional 50% through May 3rd! (*May 2014 Club Kits are excluded from this sale.)

*Most of the kits and items in our Store are already offered at discounted prices, so the extra 50% NSD Discount will be in addition to the discounts on the posted prices! That means HUGE SAVINGS on almost everything in our TSR Store!

*You must use discount code NSD2014 when placing your order through our shopping cart or via e-mail. (Put discount code in the comments section in the shopping cart; e-mail ordering is only available to current TSR members whose shipping and payment information are already on file.)

*NSD Discounts will be taken off the price manually BEFORE we process your credit card, but the discounted price will NOT appear in the shopping cart when you place your order. (Credit cards are not processed at the time that the order is placed. All orders are processed manually, and we will apply the discount BEFORE processing your payment.)

May Sneak Peek Week: Day #4

This is your first look at April Doubleshot Kit lines. Today's sneak peek layout is from the Pink Paislee blog and created by designer, Donna Espiritu. Can you name this brand new line?

Yesterday's line was Simple Stories Homespun - perfect for celebrating moms and families in May!

May Sneak Peek Week #3

Our sneak peek today comes directly from the Simple Stories blog, although I couldn't find the name of the designer for this one, as it was part of their promotional materials for this brand new CHA-Winter line. Can you name the line?

Yesterday's sneak peek line was My Mind's Eye Mildred - you'll love the "gold" embellishments in this kit!

May Sneak Peek Week: Day #2

 

Today sneak peek is brought to you by designer, Missy Whidden, and comes to you from the manufacturer's blog. Can you guess the line?

Yesterday's sneak peek line was BasicGrey Capture.

May Sneak Peek Week Begins!

Our May Sneak Peek Week begins with a layout by BasicGrey Designer, Kelly Goree, taken straight from the manufacturer's blog. Can you name this new CHA-Winter line?

Off-Topic with Tammy

Good Morning, friends! Today's post marks the second installment of the new Thursday blog series, "Off-Topic with Tammy," and I'm going to share another well-loved family recipe with you. This week's recipe comes from my second-favorite food group after "Snacks" - DESSERT - and this recipe has a little bit of well-loved history.

I'm a mom, and if you are a mom, you know that much of our time and activities are devoted to our family members. We cook and clean and plan and organize and make sure that everyone has everything they need and is where they need to be at all times. We pour ourselves into our families, grieving with them over their losses and celebrating their successes and milestones, and life kinda becomes a lot about taking care of those that the Lord has entrusted to us. As a result, sometimes we overlook our own little celebrations and milestones - like birthdays, for example.

While never expecting much on my own birthday, a few years ago, I received a true SURPRISE from a friend. After arriving at my now college-age son's middle school soccer game, I was greeted by with a big beautiful chocolate bundt cake, all wrapped up in cellophane and tied with a big happy bow - for me - for my birthday! I was stunned! Someone who was not my mom had baked a cake for ME! What a treat! And, let me just tell you, that cake was the absolute best cake that I think I've ever tasted (so moist and with chocolate chips baked inside so that it tasted like icing running throughout the cake; it truly didn't even need frosting). So of course, I asked her for the recipe, and it turns out that this uber-delicious cake starts with a boxed cake mix, which in my opinion, makes it even better. Since then, the "Bundt" is a much-anticipated treat at our house.

(The vanilla version, with white chocolate chips.)

Over the years, I've used all different flavors of cake mixes, and now I frequently bake the mix as cupcakes instead of in my bundt pan. But when I want to serve a special cake that looks as amazing as it tastes (and I don't want to mess with frosting), I go with a chocolate cake mix and Ghirardelli chocolate chips. (The chocolate cake just seems to bake up fluffier and prettier than any other flavor (it's thicker), and the Ghirardelli chips melt into the cake like butter.)

So, here is my all-time favorite go-to cake recipe. This is one to try if you want to make a boxed cake mix taste like a bakery cake!

CHRISTINE'S YUMMY BUNDT CAKE:
1 Devil's Food Cake Mix
1 small box instant chocolate pudding
4 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup water
1 bag of Ghiradelli Chocolate Chips

Mix all ingredients together except chocolate chips. (I used my stand mixer.) Fold in the chocolate chips. Grease a bundt pan (or whatever pan you want to use) and pour batter into pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.

Daily Inspiration: Layout of the Day!

Today's layout is one of my favorites from TSR Designer, Rochelle Spears, this month. She used the Bella Blvd. Lucky Starz layout kit in the April Flavors of the Month Kit. I just love those American Crafts Amy Tan Foam word Thickers, and each kit gets a full sheet of them in this kit!

Project Life Inspiration: Layout of the Day

Today's Project Life layout, created by TSR Designer, Aphra Bolyer, features some of the Project Life cards in our April Project Life Kit. The above photo shows the layout without the additional insert, and the photo below shows the extra 6"x 12" insert Aphra created to showcase some additional photos and memories. The 6"x 12" insert attaches directly to the 3-rings in the album and flips within the layout, coordinating with both the left and right pages. Perfect!

(Sides A and B of the 6"x 12' insert.)

Daily Inspiration: Layout of the Day!

Today's layout inspiration comes from TSR Designer, Rochelle Spears, and features the American Crafts Amy Tan Plus One layout kit in our April Doubleshot Kit. We have exactly one of these kits left, so order today if you don't want to miss out!

Weekend Inspiration: Sketch Challenge!

I love to send you into the weekend with a little extra inspiration and a challenge to pull out those supplies and create a page or two. This weekend, our focus will be on our monthly sketch. Each month, we feature a sketch and a couple of examples of layouts that were created based on the sketch. This month's sketch turns out some really beautiful layouts, as you'll see from our designer examples.

Your challenge this weekend is to create a layout based on the monthly sketch. You can use any supplies you have on hand, and your layout can be exactly like the sketch or loosely based on the sketch. We just want to see how it inspires you! Post a link to your layout in the comments section of the blog or on our Facebook page, and if we get at least (3) entries, then we'll be giving away another $5.00 Gift Certificate to the ScrapRoom Store on Tuesday.

Take a peek at the layouts that our designers created using this month's sketch. SO LOVELY!

April Sketch by www.pagemaps.com

by TSR Designer, Brenda Ragsdale

by TSR Designer, Rochelle Spears

Off-Topic with Tammy

Hey Friends!
I've decided to try something new on the blog on Thursdays. I know that The ScrapRoom is a site dedicated to scrapbooking and scrapbooking kits, but we all know that life is not one-dimensional, so I thought I'd take one day a week to share some of the other dimensions in my life... and so we begin, "Off-Topic with Tammy."

Here's a bit about me. I am the owner of The ScrapRoom, an online monthly scrapbooking kit club that began in October 2004. It's been a great ride, and I'm looking forward to celebrating 10 years in business in October 2014! And while my business is The ScrapRoom, my main job and focus in life is my family. My husband, Chris, and I have been married for almost 23 years, and we have (5) amazing boys, ages 20, 19, 17, 15, and 14. My oldest two sons are in college, and my youngest three sons are in high school and middle school and are active in sports (cross-country, soccer and track) and church life. As a family, we keep very busy, and I am blessed beyond measure to have been able to work from home while my children were/are growing up.

(A recent family photo taken last fall while on vacation, doing what we LOVE to do - hiking in different parts of the country, seeing some of the treasures that God made for us to see. Gifts!)

As you can imagine, with (5) super-active and growing boys, one of the biggest roles in my life is feeding them! I spend a lot of time planning meals, shopping for food, cooking food and cleaning up the kitchen! Fortunately for me and for my family, I love to cook (and I love to eat, which is not-so-fortunate for my figure - but that's for another post. :) And, while I do regularly cook meat and vegetables, my favorite thing to make is "good snacks." In fact, I have always had a "knack for snacks" and have an entire board dedicated to my favorite food group on Pinterest. (Feel free to follow me here: Tammy's Snacks & Treat Pinterest Board) So today, I want to share a recipe I recently found and adapted on Pinterest for Salted Caramel Pretzel Bark - a new snack that disappears as fast as I can make it. It's caramelly, chocolatey, salty, crunchy and highly addictive - and it feeds a crowd!

SALTED CARAMEL PRETZEL BARK

1 16-oz. bag of mini pretzel twists

4 sticks of butter (YIKES!)

2 cups of brown sugar

1 bag of chocolate chips (2 cups)

coarsely ground sea salt

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• Line (2) large jelly roll pans with parchment paper and divide the bag of pretzels between the two pans. Try to get them into a single layer, but mine overlapped quite a bit. (It's all good...)
• In a medium saucepan, melt the butter and the brown sugar until the sugar is dissolved. Let it boil and turn into a nice smooth caramel. Stir occasionally. (I found that I got a nice consistency/flavor when I boiled the caramel mixture for 2 minutes after it started to boil.)
• Remove from the heat and pour evenly over the top of the pretzels. Put pans in the oven for 5 minutes.
• Sprinkle chocolate chips over the top. Put pans back in the over for 2 minutes more.
• Remove pans and spread chocolate chips around with a spatula.
• Sprinkle generously with coarse salt.
• Let cool on the counter for a few minutes and then pop into the freezer for 2-3 hours.
• Remove from the freezer and break it up into chunks.

We host a high school boys Bible Study in our home on Friday afternoons (topic for a different off-topic post), and the boys gobbled these two pans of yumminess down before I could refill the koolaid pitcher. It's a keeper! Enjoy your Easter Holiday Weekend!

Daily Inspiration: Layout of the Day!

Today's Layout of the Day comes from Brenda Ragsdale and the Simple Stories A Charmed Life layout kit in our April Flavors of the Month Kit. Using pop dots with stickers is a eye-catching and inexpensive way to add dimension to your layout. You can layer the stickers for added interest. I am a HUGE fan of Simple Stories' 12x12 Fundamental Sticker Sheets, as they provide so many options for embellishing cards and layouts at a great price.

Project Life Inspiration: Sketch

It's been a while since I've created a Project Life sketch, so I thought I would put one together for April.  The sketch was inspired by one of my journaling cards from this month's pages.

Rather than a journaling card, I created a Title Card sketch since those are the ones that I tend to turn to the most.  Here's the sketch.

Hope you enjoy and that you'll give it a go.  Please post a link here or on Facebook, so we can all see your take.  

Thanks for popping in!  Aphra

Daily Inspiration: Layout of the Day!

Our Layout of the Day comes from Brenda Carpenter and the Bella Blvd. Lucky Starz layout kit in our April Flavors of the Month Kit. Great colors - and LOVE those foam word thickers!

Weekend Challenge: Scraplift a Recipe Card!

Our April Recipe Cards are LIVE and ready to be downloaded with the monthly password that came with your April Flavors of the Month Kit. We've made scrappin' two-page layouts super-easy for you by creating (4) full-color Recipe Cards, complete with cutting and assembly directions for creating a two-page layout with each of the four layout kits in the Flavors of the Month Kit.

Your challenge for this weekend is to use one of the April Recipe Cards to create a layout. You can, of course, put your own spin on the layout if you choose. We just want to give you a jumping-off place to get your creative juices flowing. So, choose your favorite, download the Recipe Card to save you some time and "get two pages done" this weekend Post a link to your layout in the comments section here or on our Facebook page to be entered into the drawing for a $5.00 Gift Certificate to the TSR Store. We'll pick a winner on Tuesday morning.

American Crafts Dear Lizzy Daydreamer Recipe layout by Rochelle Spears

Fancy Pants Be Different Recipe layout by Brenda Ragsdale

Simple Stories A Charmed Life Recipe layout by Brenda Carpenter (Month-In-Review)

Bella Blvd. Lucky Starz Recipe layout by Tammy Harp

Daily Inspiration: Layout of the Day!

Today's inspiration comes from designer, Rochelle Spears, and was created using the Pebbles Garden Party layout kit from our April Doubleshot Kit. Rochelle did some punching and fussy-cutting and layering and background stamping to create this beautiful layout - although that adorable dimensional butterfly comes 

pre-made, and (2) of them are included in this layout kit!

Daily Inspiration: Layout of the Day!

Today's layout inspiration comes from designer, Brenda Ragsdale, and features the Bella Blvd. Lucky Starz layout kit in our April Flavors of the Month Kit. Brenda sets off a sweet polaroid-type photo with layers of patterned paper and balances the layout by adding snippets of layered papers strategically around the perimeter and a few ink splashes to connect everything together. Quick-and-easy for scraplifting!

Project Life Inspiration!

This week's Project Life inspiration is brought to you by our Project Life designer, Aphra Bolyer, who has moved from traditional scrapbooking to photo-sleeve scrapbooking almost exclusively over the past couple of years. Today's layout features some of the Simple Stories A Charmed Life cards from our April Project Life Kit. The cards have so much personality and color by themselves that she didn't need to add hardly any additional embellishments.

Daily Inspiration: Layout of the Day!

Today's Layout of the Day is brought to you by designer, Brenda Carpenter, and features the Fancy Pants Be Different layout kit from the April Flavors of the Month Kit and the April Embellishment Kit. The (4) standard-sized photos and smattering of stickers makes for another quick-and-easy layout!

Don't forget to enter your layout into the Weekend Challenge for a chance to win a $5.00 Gift Certificate. The deadline to enter is today. We'll choose a winner tomorrow. See all of the details HERE!

Weekend Challenge - and a Prize!

Our weekend inspiration is coming on Satruday instead of Friday this week because I didn't want to break up our April Kit Parade. :) This weekend's inspiration is another quick-and-easy layout by TSR designer, Brenda Carpenter. She used the American Crafts Dear Lizzy Daydreamer layout kit in this month's Flavors of the Month Kit, but you can choose any collection of patterned paper that you have on hand.

AND, if you take up the weekend challenge and create a layout inspired by Brenda's layout, then post a link to your layout in the comments section here on the blog or on our ScrapRoom Facebook page. You'll be entered into a drawing for a $5.00 gift certificate to spend in the TSR Store. So, why not pull out a few supplies and get a 30-minute page done AND grab a chance a few freebie scrappin' goodies to add to your collection!

PP#1 (across top of page): 12"x 2"

PP#2 (along right edge of page): 3"x 10"

PP#3 (along left edge of page): 1"x 10"

PP#4 (along bottom edge of PP#1): 12"x 1/2"

PP#5 (along bottom edge of page): 12"x 1/4"

PP #6 (on top of PP#2): 3"x 1.5"

Photo Collage: 8.5"x 10" sheet

Final Kits in our April Kit Parade...

And, we're wrapping up our April Kit Parade with our final two kits - our Project Life Kit, perfect for the wildly popular pocket page scrapbooking and our Doubleshot Kit (two bonus layout kits).

This month's Project Life Kit features 4x6 and 3x4 cards from four different product lines, two different styles of puffy stickers (perfect accents for pocket cards - dimensional, but not too thick), coordinating alphabet and journaling stickers, and TWO rolls of the brand new Mini Washi Tape from American Crafts. Each of our Project Life Kits contain enough supplies for 8-10 pocket pages! Check out the full list of Project Life kit contents.

American Crafts Plus One

American Crafts Daydreamer

Fancy Pants Be Different

Simple Stories A Charmed Life

Our April Doubleshot Kit features two completely different product lines from our Flavors of the Month, for those scrapbookers who want to discover some additional paper lines. Our Doubleshot Layout Kits are slightly "plumpier" than our FOTM Layout Kit, with an extra sheet of coordinating cardstock and a few more embellishments. Check out our April Doubleshot Kit content list.

April Add-On Kits... more of what you love!

At The ScrapRoom, we encourage our members to customize their product options based on their own personal scrapbooking styles and budgets. We start with our monthly Flavors of the Month Kit and we build everything around that. All of our add-on kits are designed to coordinate with our Flavors of the Month Kit.

For those scrapbookers who like to use a LOT of embellishments, for lumpy-and-bumpy-and-layered-and-textured layouts, we offer our EMBELLISHMENT KIT.

(I'm particularly fond of those miniature washi tapes this month!)

For those who can't get enough patterned papers and love to layer patterns and colors, we offer our PATTERNED PAPER KIT, which contains (2) additional patterned papers to coordinate with each of the (4) layout kits in the main monthly kit.

For those who love to use cardstock as the base for their your and love to have lots of cardstock options for mounting your photos, we offer our coordinating CARDSTOCK KIT, which contains (3) additional sheets of cardstock to coordinate with each of the (4) layout kits in the main monthly kit.

(And, occasionally we even throw in some specialty cardstock, like this month's 2-sided cardstock from LilyBee Designs. One side features a solid color and the other side features a tone-on-tone polka dot! LOVE!)

And finally, for the stampers among us, we offer a coordinating STAMP SET each month. Some months, our featured stamp set will come from the same paper line as one of our layout kits in the Flavors of the Month Kit, and some months, we feature a stamp set that is more generally scrapbooker-friendly.

(This month's stamp set, from Simple Stories, is a great all-around journaling set, perfect for traditional and Project Life scrapbook pages alike!)

So, which add-on kits will you choose this month?

April Kits are LIVE!

Our April Kits and the April Idea Gallery are both live and super-fun this month! We've got lots of variety in style and colors in this month's kits - from bold and daring to soft and sweet. Take a peek!

American Crafts Dear Lizzy Daydreamer

Bella Blvd. Lucky Starz

Fancy Pants Be Different

Simple Stories A Charmed Life