Toward mid August, many parents begin to look a little tired or frazzled. Summer break will soon come to a close and a whole new school year will begin. During school hours, moms might be finding they have a little more time to themselves. The stars of your scrapbook collages will be spending the day studying reading, writing, and arithmetic while you spend a little less time putting out fires, stopping sibling rivalries, and cleaning up bumps, scratches, and bruises from homemade bike ramps and daily dare devil stunts. Possibly, you might be using your hours of peace and quiet to scrap all about your family's fun summer memories or craft ahead into the upcoming holiday season.
I think this new cartridge that I am exploring this week in this newsletter is vastly becoming one of my favorite cartridges. When I discovered
Storybook I couldn't resist pulling my little Circuit bug aka "Eddie" out to see what this cartridge contained. I was pleasantly surprised to discover a varity of images, letters, and two additional font styles on this cartridge. The creative features that are included: Tall/Border, Shortly/Holes, Fancy/Corner, Accent/Frame, Shadow, and Accent Blackout. This week I will discuss the images that are included and the shadow feature. The title for this cartridge lives up to its name; the letters have nice straight lines with a curve to give the letters a nice fairytale feeling.
One of the greatest and exciting features that comes with this cartridge is each button on the overlay has a letter attached to it. When you apply the shift button then you get an image instead of a letter. For example, letter "A" also has a flower, letter "B" has a leaf. The shadow feature lets you create a shadow layer for each image or letter to help you designs pop or stand out. Other images that you receive are: butterfly's, bird's, Cockatoo, an Owl, branches with leaves, flowers, a floral design, heart, a few floral swirls, Daisy, vines, numbers, corner swirls, a few crowns, and a few Marquee's.
The phrases that come with this cartridge are: "Once Upon a Time", "Happily Ever After", "A Whish Came True", "Thank You", "Birthday Girl or Boy", and "To, From, And, The". Wow! I couldn't believe all the possibilities you can create with this cartridge. You can create your own titles for scrapbook pages or projects, and the Marquee's work great as backgrounds for the phrases or even a photo. They would even look great as a journal tag for your scrapbook page.
Since this cartridge is not yet on the
DesignStudio software I called a friend of mine and had her create a project with the software. Kendra has a unique creative ability to create scrapbook pages and so I asked her to design something for you. She created a Halloween page layout and its absolutely adorable and I know that you will love it as much as I do. I've included the
cut file and the instructions if you want to create this yourself. If you have some trouble opening the file, you may have to use a previous version of the software.
~Crafty Kimber
Instructions: Trick Or Treat
By Kendra Wiggins
12X12 Layout using
DesignStudio & the
Cricut Expression Supplies: -
Cricut Expression- Cricut
DesignStudio Loaded on your computer
-
Makin' the Grade Cricut Cartridge
-
Paper Doll Dress Up Cricut Cartridge
- Plantin Schoolbook Cricut Cartridge
-
12x12 Cricut Cutting Mat - 1 Sheet of ki memories Haunted Skinny Stripe 1913 (12"x12"Black on Black Polka Dot Side)
- 1 Sheet of ki Memories Haunted Sentiment 1932 (11 8/4"x11 8/4" Orange Happy Halloween Side)
- 1 Sheet of ki Memories Haunted Webs 1931 (12"x12" Black on Black Spider Web. I used the Clear Star Sakura Gelly Roll Pen to accent the Spider Webs before Cutting. I just drew the Spider webs in)
- 2 Sheet of Solid Black Cardstock (6"x12" strip for Photo Mat & 7"X7" for Trick Or Treat Layers)
- 1 Sheet of Prism Frosted Orange OR004-D (This is a wonderful skin tone. 4"x6" for Witch's Body)
- 1 Sheet of ki Memories Haunted Sky 1933 (6"x12" Purple on Purple stars Side for Photo Mat & 5"x6" Green Side for Trick Or Treat Layers)
- 1 Sheet of ki Memories Haunted Cross Section 1917 (5"x5" Purple on Purple Polka Dots side for Trick Or Treat Layers)
- Tombow Aqua Mono Glue
- Zip Dry Paper Glue (To adhere the Cat's and Frog's eyes)
- Black Pen (To draw in Spider Strings & to draw on the Witch's & Frog's facial features)
- White Signo Gel Pen (To draw the accents on the Witch's eyes)
- Clear Star Sakura Gelly Roll Pen (I used this to accent the Spider Webs on the Haunted Webs Paper & to draw over the black line I draw for the Spider Strings)
- Stickles Glitter Glue in Assorted Colors (A wonderful way to add a little or a lot of Bling to the Letters, Spiders, the Witches Dress and Hat)
- Black Doodlebug Flock (For Nose of Cat)
- 1 pair Wiggle Eyes (For Froggy's Eyes)
- 1 pair Animal Eyes (For Cat's Eyes)
Directions:
1. To create your background: Lay the 12x12 sheet of Haunted Skinny Stripe (Black on Black Polka Dots) down as your base
2. Cut the 12x12 sheet of Haunted Sentiment (Happy Halloween Orange) down to 11 8/4" x 11 8/4"
3. Glue your Happy Halloween Orange down centering it on the Black on Black Polka Dot
4. Set aside
5. On your computer open the .cut file (TrickOrTreatLayoutbyKendraWiggins.cut--see above)
6. Place the 12x12 sheet of Haunted Webs (Black on Black Spider Webs) on the 12x12 Cutting Mat. Like this:
7. Select the cutting mat on the computer titled "Trick Or Treat cut one out of black"
8. Load Paper into Expression using the Load Paper Key
9. Make sure that you have your Expression Pressure and Blade depth set to the correct setting for your machine. (Mine is Max. Pressure and a Blade depth of 6)
10. On your computer, Click the Scissors Key
11. Your Expression is now going to ask you to load your cartridges one at a time into your machine. You will need to load them into your machine one at a time as it prompts you to, clicking OK after each addition.
12. Once the cutting is complete, carefully remove your cut and center it on the black and orange background to check placement.
13. Using your glue sparingly, glue the Cut out to the background. Be sure to get it centered.
14. On your computer select the cutting mat titled "Cut Large Mat-Black, Small Mat-Purple".
15. Load your Cutting Mat with a 6"x12" strip of Black cardstock and a 6"x12" strip of Memories Haunted Sky (Purple on Purple Stars) Note: The Black Cardstock will go on the left of your mat and the Purple on Purple Stars will go on the right like this:
16. Load Paper and click Cut on your computer.
17. Once complete, remove cuts from cutting mat and glue down black Mat to the Trick or Treat Layout.
18. Glue the Purple mat down centering it on the black mat. Set aside.
19. On the computer, Select the mat titled "Trick Or Treat Layers".
20. Load Paper on mat according to this:
21. Be sure to count on your mat to double check paper placement. The Solid Black Cardstock goes in the top left, The Haunted Sky (Green) goes on the top right. The Haunted Cross Section (Purple on Purple Polka Dots) goes on the bottom Left and the Prism Skin tone goes on the bottom right. Be sure to double check that the paper is turned the correct way.
Gluing Order: 22. Glue the Cat down. Using Zip Dry, glue on the Animal eyes (Let Dry) once the eyes are dry, make a small dab of glue over where the nose is. Lightly put some Black Flock on the glue and blow the rest away.
23. Draw on the Frog's Facial Features.
24. Glue the Frog's wiggle eyes on using Zip Dry. Glue the frog to the layout. Being careful not to glue where your picture is going to go. I usually only glue the right side of the frog. Leave the left side unattached so you can get your picture under the frogs arm.
