I hope everyone has had an awesome month so far! May is always so busy with kids getting out of school, graduations, planning vacations… WHEW! But I hope you’ve found time to do a little crafting. Stay tuned to see the reveal of Beth’s take on our theme. Why no reveal from me? Well, I am still in Ireland, but I will be back for June’s challenges!

And now here’s the latest theme challenge to get you motivated!

Theme: Mom – In (late) celebration of mother’s day, make a layout featuring your lovely mom!
Criteria (use at least two):
1. Use at least two different kinds of flowers – mix types of flower (roses with daisies, etc) or materials (paper with fabric), etc
2. Include glitter, glitter glue, or glitter embossing powder
3. Include paper lace

To join in the challenge fun, just upload a picture of your layout/cards/project to our Facebook page by June 5. The project with the most “likes” will be entered into our quarterly prize drawing (to be held after the June #2) challenge.

WOW! I can’t believe it is already May! Where has the time gone? Evidently it flew right by me because the May #1 challenge reveal date was supposed to be yesterday.

I have a good excuse though for forgetting though. My mind is already in vacation mode because my husband and I are leaving tomorrow for a 17-day vacation in Ireland! We have wanted to go to Ireland for years, and with this being our 10-year anniversary, we figured this was as good a time as any. So y’all will have to forgive me if I am totally scatterbrained!

Our first challenge of every month is a color challenge and this month’s color combo is:

YELLOW AND CREAM/BEIGE!

To play along with our challenge, just upload a picture of your layout/card/home decor project using yellow and cream to our Facebook page by May 23. The project with the most “likes” is entered into our quarterly prize drawing!

Hi again, everyone!  These are my projects for our first May challenge.  This time I decided to make some cards instead of a layout.

Thanks for looking, and I hope you’ll all be sure to come join us in the challenge!

x Beth

Materials

Paper:
Making Memories (English Garden), My Mind’s Eye (Lost and Found)

Inks/Mediums:
Ranger Archival Ink (Jet Black), Ranger Distress Ink (Antique Linen), Ranger Stickles (Yellow), Prismacolor Pencils

Stamps:
Queen Kat Designs (Ballerina Francis Mary), TPC Studio (Whimsy Greetings)

Embellishments:
Prima flowers

Materials

Paper:
Making Memories (English Garden), K & Company (Julianne), Basic Grey (Basics Manila)

Inks/Mediums:
Ranger Archival Ink (Jet Black), Ranger Stickles (Yellow), Prismacolor Pencils

Stamps:
Queen Kat Designs (Little Cuties), Fiskars (Wishes All Around)

Materials

Paper:
K & Company (Julianne)

Inks/Mediums:
Ranger Archival Ink (Jet Black), Ranger Distress Ink (Antique Linen), Ranger Distress Markers

Stamps:
Queen Kat Designs (Side By Side Francis Mary), Fiskars (Wishes All Around)

Embellishments:
Prima floral border

Welcome back, everyone!  This challenge was perfect as we are a family of pet lovers and there is never any shortage of adorable pet photos.  This layout features my sister’s small horse dog Nala.  I love this pic since it looks like she’s grinning at the camera.

The three challenge criteria are:

- To make the title of the page “Hi, My Name Is ___.”  And since I couldn’t fit “Nala Pala the Disney Dog” in the little space, we have to just make do with “Hi, My Name Is Nala.”

- To doodle or draw a border for the photo, which I did with a Zig marker directly on the photo.

- To double or triple mat the photo.

Done, done, and done.

To finish the whole thing off, I embellished the little strips randomly with some Prima flowers and Stickles.

Thanks so much for looking, and please be sure to come join us in the challenge!

x Beth

Materials

Paper:
Basic Grey (Green At Heart)

Inks/Mediums
Ranger Distress Ink (Ripe Persimmon), Ranger Distress Stickles (Spiced Marmalade) Zig Posterman Paint Marker

Embellishments:
Prima flowers

Hands down, my obsession is Diet Coke. I love it. I can’t go through a single day without it. Is it good for me? Probably not. Is it an expensive habit? Definitely. Do I care? Not at all.

Like my journaling says, “If loving Diet Coke is wrong, I don’t want to be right.”

Oh and though I am normally a spelling and grammar fanatic, it was not until I had made the page, scanned it, and uploaded it here that I realized the word “Obsession” is spelled wrong on my layout! Oh well, maybe I haven’t had enough Diet Coke today. Must go remedy that…..

For this layout, I used two challenge criteria. I used my computer and printer for the journaling and I used a solid color cardstock for the background of the layout.

Materials used:

Paper/cardstock — WorldWin cardstock, BoBunny, Sassafras, American Crafts, Nikki Sivils, Pink Paislee

Embellishments — chipboard letters by Advantus, stickers by 7Gypsies and Creative Imaginations, cardstock border by Bazzill, staples by Tim Holtz

Ink — Colorsnap ColorBox Fluid Chalk ink in “Charcoal”

Tools — Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher

Congragulations to Denayc, the winner of a $15 gift certificate to Gauche Alchemy!

Denayc, the certificate is on its way to you!  Thanks for playing!

Just a quick note to let everyone know we are taking the holiday weekend to enjoy family time and cookouts (and in some cases, overtime at work ).

We’ll be back to announce June’s winner and tell what July’s prize will be on Tuesday, July 5th.

We wish you and yours a safe and happy 4th of July Weekend!

Oh, and this’ll be the last couple of days to leave a comment telling us who you are if you submitted an anonymous entry to either June challenge.  We can only name you a winner if we know who you are!

Hey everyone!  First off, I’d like to thank everyone who participates in our challenges.  You guys rock, and we love seeing what creative things come through the galleries!

We are going to have to impose one rule on the prizes.  I wanted to post it here just to make sure that everyone is aware.

If you win the random draw for a prize (whether it is a monthly challenge prize or a Better Blogs prize), you must respond with an email to betterscrap.info@gmail.com WITHIN 5 DAYS OF THE DRAWING and claim your prize.  If you do not contact us within 5 days, you forfeit your prize.

Using the April challenge prize as an example, it will work like this:

April’s winners will be drawn on May 1.  They will have until May 6 to contact us to claim their prize.  May 7 comes around and they have not claimed their prize, the prize is forfeit.

Because this is not a sponsored blog (meaning that the prizes are purchased out of pocket and not donated by any manufacturers or sites), it is not possible to keep a running list of prizes (and therefore the funds to purchase the prizes) that are due to winners indefinitely.

I hope that you all will continue to join in the challenges. 

Thanks!

Last week I was late posting the Better Blog, so I’m posting this one early to restore balance to the force. Well, actually it’s because it’s a super cute St. Patrick’s Day project and I thought some of you, like me, would like to give it a go before St. Patrick’s Day is over.

This tutorial comes to us from Jamie at My Tiny Little Corner Of The World. Last time we featured one of her tutorials I mentioned that she has lots of great projects on her blog. This is another example. Be sure to drop by her blog and leave some love in the comments! 

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St. Patrick’s Day Treat Box Tutorial

Print template onto desired cardstock and cut out along solid lines.

Make folds along the dotted lines. Tip: Use an embossing stylus to help make the folds along the curved lines.

Apply ink to folded edges. Lay piece flat on table with the inside side of the cardstock facing the table. Apply double sided tape to the two flaps along the arched side of the box.

Bring the right side flaps together and then the left side flaps together to form a fry container. Set box to the side.

Using Cuttlebug and Spellbinders dies, cut a circle and scalloped circle. I used the second smallest of each of the dies. Apply desired ink and attach the circle on top of the scalloped diecut.

Stamp heart shape three time to mimic a clover. Using the same color ink pad and a Fantastix tool, draw the clover stem. Tip: Using Fantastix allows an exact color match to any stamped image since you can use the same ink color.

Stamp desired sentiment.

Attach ribbon around box and add stamped medallion. The box can them be filled and any type of goodies.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this tutorial and I’d love to see your take on the treat box.

This week’s tutorial comes to us courtesy of Loretta at Stamping with Loretta.

This one’s a video tutorial for an adorable card.  It features products from Queen Kat Designs, from whom last month’s prize came.  

Thanks so much for the use of your tutorial, Loretta!  Take a minute to stop by her blog and see some great inspiration for some great cards and stamped projects (and leave some love in the comments if you do!).

If you have a tutorial or project you’d like to see featured on our site, please email the link to betterscrap.info@gmail.com!