A few weeks ago I got a new scrapbooking toy — a Cricut. A Cricut is an electronic die-cutting machine — sort of like a self-contained computer with a knife in it. Or maybe a printer, except instead of ink it’s got a knife? Except, a printer needs to be hooked to your computer and the Cricut doesn’t. Got it now?I gave Zach and Wyatt a little demo a few weeks ago and Zach photographed it, so I’ll show you too, Internet.
So here’s the machine all ready to go. In the lower right corner there, you can see the font cartidge is plugged in. The one I’m using here is a basic serif font called Base Camp. You can get all kinds of cartidges with shapes and stuff on them, but I’m mostly planning to use mine to cut out letters. I’m not so into the whole shape thing on my layouts.
Next, I set the letter size, from 1 – 5 1/2 inches and type in the text I want to cut out. I then put a piece of paper onto the sticky cutting mat, insert the mat into the machine and let it do it’s business.
Once the letter has been cut, I remove it from the mat with an Exacto knife. The mat is pretty sticky to keep the paper from slipping while it’s being cut, so this can be tricky sometimes.
I can also set the machine to cut shadow versions of the image.
Now I can stick the two pieces together. Wyatt helps put the adhesive on.
I’ve been having a lot of fun with my new toy. I’ve used it on every scrapbook project I’ve worked on since I got it. Stay tuned for some new layouts featuring my Cricut.
All photos by Zach.
