How you can make paper lace and doilies with your Silhouette

I used these fantastic digital lace edge fonts from creationcassel.com with my Silhouette to make these fun doilies and lace.  The lace border gave this card an elegant feel.

I bet you are asking why don't I just use a store bought doily?  Well, with these fonts I can chose my own design from a large range and without having to buy an entire package of the same design and I can make it any size I want.  Also, those store bought doilies are thin and flimsy and with these fonts I can add stitching holes to a nice sturdy piece of cardstock and stitch a border.  See this previous post to learn how to add stitching holes.

Store bought doilies and lace are usually white, but with these fonts I can chose any colour I want, like this mint for example :D

 

Some helpful tips:
*Use upper case versions of the fonts, they will cut easier.
*They take a while to cut, so be patient, it's worth the wait.
*Use the toggle button on your Silhouette to get the design to wrap around a circle to make a doily.
*Some of the designs are more intricate than others so they are a bit harder to cut out, so if you want to use one of these, then make sure you enlarge it.

Now, what are you waiting for?  Hurry and grab a set today and get cutting :D

Lace Edge fonts

Tips to help you prepare for your next class or event

So I'm going to Version Scrap in Paris in 2 days and I am so giddy!! I'm taking classes from Debby Schuh and Ali Edwards.  I've just finished packing and I realised that I've got it down to a system and I'm pretty good at it ;)

Here are some tips to help you pack for your next class or event so that you are prepared and organised without overpacking but are ready to scrapbook!

I'm packing a lot of my stuff in a Cath Kidston bag, jsut for Debby ;)

If you are taking multiple classes with very different supply lists, then pack a different bag for each class.  For example if you are taking one class that has a lot of messy paints and inks, keep them in a separate bag from your paper trimmer and crop-a-dile for that next, less messy class.

Better yet, if you can, try and schedule all the messy classes on one day and the more paper-only classes on another.  We did this a few years ago, we took all of Donna Doney's classes on one day and Debby Schuh's the next to minimise the amount of things we needed to bring each day.

Don't over pack.  If you feel like you'll want to add your own embellishments in addition to the supplies that are included in the kit, wait until you get home. Otherwise you'll have to bring a tonne of stuff to make sure you have enough choice.  Am I right? ;)

If the teacher asks you to prepare things before hand, make sure you do it.  Even if you end up not finishing the project and you feel like that prep could have been done afterwards, do it beforehand anyway!  I find that I make more effort to finish a project if I've put a lot of work into it before hand, like priniting photos.

Here are all my photos and notes for the Day in the Life that I documented for Ali's class.  It's all tucked into one of my take along memory keepers.  and see that cute little Paris tag, it's from the Cut Shoppe!

Since I'll be out of the country, I won't have much access to internet, but when I do I'll be posting photos to Instagram, you can follow me here!

5 awesome cool things that you didn't know your Silhouette could do :D

 

1. Did you know that included in the free cutfiles that come with your Silhouette there is one to help you customise your control panel?

 

2.  If you use scraps on your mat to cut out different colours for your design you can not only use up your scraps instead of a new sheet of cardstock, you can also cut all of the pieces at once so that you don't have to keep coming back to cut each individual colour.

 

cutfile from the Cut Shoppe

3.  Have you noticed this funny little hole on your Silhouette?  At first I thought it was just a place to hold the ratchet-y thing that you use to change the blade setting.  but it just kept falling off and getting lost and then I may or may not have used my teeth to change the blade setting ;)  Recently I found out that it actually is a built-in ratchet!  Wow, do my teeth feel stupid ;)

 

4. Did you ever have a cutfile you loved but it was just a little too thick or too thin?  Or maybe you wanted to mat it with another cut?  I've tried to adjust images and text before by changing the size, but the dimensions were still too thick or thin. And when I tried to mat things this way the images or text didn't line up.  I just discovered the Offset function! It's fantastic for making things the thickness you want or adding mats!

I love taking cutfiles from the Cut Shoppe and making them really big, but I find they get too thick, so I love to use the Offset function to thin them out and make them look their best.

5.  I recently posted this layout where I used my Silhouette to make the holes for the stitching.  I thought I could use one of the dotted lines in the Line Style function, but they were too 'dash-y' and I needed holes.  A quick google search turned up a tutorial by Corri Garza that showed me how to run a text along the outside of my cutfile, a text with only periods that would then be just a bunch of circles.

Some Fun and Exciting News!!

The Cut Shoppe
the Cut Shoppe blog

follow the Cut Shoppe on your favourite social media
facebook
instagram
pinterest

 

I'm in wonderful company!  These ladies are new to the team as well:

HEATHER ADAMS

MAGDA BOLINSKA

MARY-ANN MALDONADO

MISSY WHIDDEN

STEPHANIE STRADER

TARRAH McLEAN

 

And, these ladies are returning from last term:

 

ALLIE STEWART

AMY COOSE

DANIELLE de KONINK

GINA LIDEROS

How to use Your Cut Files to make FUN shaped cards in 7 Easy Steps :D

 

 

bat owl by PPdN Designs
hockey skate by Sarah Bailey

Here are the steps to making your own shaped cards. I've broken it down for you so that even if you are a beginner die cutter, you can make shaped cards :D  I use a silhouette, but you can adapt the steps to your electronic die cutter.

 

Step 1  Decide on a cut file whose shape would make a good card and resize it.  I like to go roughly 4X6 (10x15cm) so that it will fit in a standard envelope.

tip resize all of the pieces of the design at the beginning so that they will all fit together once the card is finished.

 

Step 2  Open the TRACE window, and selecte Trace Outer Edge, to trace around only the outside edge.  Move everything else aside for now, including the piece you just traced, leaving just the traced outer edge. 

 tip You may want to rotate the image to get a straight line on top (if you want a flip up card) or on the left side (if you want a regular card) to make a nice fold.  For example, I lined up the two points of my bat's ears on the same line on the grid.

 

Step 3 In the Replicate window, choose mirror above if you want your card to flip up or mirror left if you want your card to open like a book.

tip If the tops of your images (in a flip up card) or sides (in a regular card) don't completely touch, you may want to draw lines at each end where the images meet.  I made mine big, fat and blue below so you can see better.

 

Step 4  Next, open the Trace window and trace around the outer edge again, getting both versions of the image.  Then, you can get rid of the other images.  Don't forget the little lines if you used those.

tip  You can group the pieces before tracing to make deleting them all easier.

 

Step 5 Now, you need to make a score line so your card will fold easily.  Move your image so that one fo the lighter grey lines from the grid runs right where you want your fold to be.  This makes it easier to get a straight score line.  It doesn't matter if that means putting parts of your image off of the cutting area, you can move it all later.  Open the Line Style window and choose a dashed line.  With the Draw a line tool from the menu on the left, draw your score line.

 

Step 6 Select both the score line and the complete design and group them. (See tip from step 4)

 

Step 7  Move the piece to where you'd like it and cut!  Cut other pieces from the design as usual and have fun decorating your card :D

I'm working on my Christmas cards next! Keep an eye out for them coming here soon, along with something fun that I have in the works!! :D