Have you ever looked at a project and thought to yourself, "Wow, wonder how they did that?" Recently, several of our Craft Room members have called in to ask how to make corners that curve into the square. In other words; how do you invert the corner? It is a technique worth learning and once you have mastered the skill you will find all kinds of ways to use it.
Richard is the Pazzles demonstrator that you will see at the Oyster Stamps stand at craft shows around the UK. He is always happy to meet, help and advise any Pazzles users, as well as demonstrate the software and the Inspiration machine to prospective users. Richard has put together three workshops on the 2nd, 16th and 30th of July. These will be full day workshops starting at 10:00 and will run till 16:00, with a break for lunch. The workshops will be at The Galtres Centre, Easingwold, North Yorkshire.
The Pazzles Prattler reports today that the dashing investigative reporter, Blade Sharpe, has solved the mystery of The Four Gray Rollers. Sources close to the investigation say that Blade uncovered the truth while doing research in the Pazzles video library. If you purchased an Inspiration lately, you may have been puzzled by the packet of 4 small gray rubber rings.
How about a weekend with wonderful women learning more about your favorite cutting machine? Would you attend? We are hoping to have our first ever Pazzles Retreat in the fall! Before we get too far in the planning process we wanted to get your feedback so that we can make it the best experience possible. The first retreat will be held here in Idaho with the hope that we can expand into other regions of the United States if the first one goes well.
Elegance does not need to be expensive. Your Inspiration can help you make beautiful etched glass accents for any summer occasion. These etched wine goblets, mirror, flat glass marbles and candle make elegant pieces for an outdoor wedding, wine tasting or birthday party. You can custom create any design you envision and convert plain, inexpensive glass into a look that any hostess can be proud of.
Stick Pins and Hat Pins are items that remind me of my grandmother’s jewelry box. They were something I rarely saw her wear but were fascinating to me as a child. I do remember seeing them on occasion when she wore one of those little hats with the veil over her forehead. My mom had one with a top shaped like a teapot that she wore stuck in her coat lapel. Now I see them added to cards and scrapbook pages as an accent to the design. Most often I see them with beads but I also see other tops to the pins that add interest to the page or card theme.
Being ‘Green’ can mean a lot of things. In my grandparents day you had a green thumb if you could grow plants well. The ‘reduce, reuse and recycle’ movement has been gaining momentum but really started in the 70’s about the same time as the advent of Earth Day. More recently it means to be aware of the impact your everyday life has on the environment. My grandma would probably say that reusing and recycling was just a way of life for her generation and they would have called it being thrifty. However, it seems that having a thrifty mindset is something that the rest of us have to work at. Today’s project is a great way to use some “found” objects that you might have thrown away in the past. You can also use up those small bits of vinyl you have after cutting a larger project. It makes a great gift for someone who loves to garden or just something fun for your own green thumb!
Father’s Day cards tend to be either funny or sentimental and often the meaning is lost on young children. Cards for the graduate become one of many that are quickly discarded and forgotten. This week’s lesson shows you how to make a meaningful word book as a card for a grad or dad. The Grad card becomes a special memento of a milestone in the young person’s life by including pictures and copies of the graduation announcements, programs and school logo. The book has plenty of pockets to tuck a gift card or money and include pictures of favorite moments at school. The word books shown are a variation of the traditional word book and are a little less complicated to create.
I have always loved the look of stenciled wood and walls. It has long been a standard in home décor. Did you know that you can stencil almost any surface? I have seen beautiful projects using stenciling on walls, windows, furniture, plaques, fabric and even plastic. I have also used stenciling in my card making and scrapbook pages. I used a stencil to create the background for this scrapbook page and also used it to stencil fill the wings on the main butterfly.
I love to make scrapbook pages but I have to admit that cropping the photos can be a bit hit or miss. I am sure many of you have created your design or frame and then found out that you printed the picture too large or too small. I am also guilty of the “I’ll just trim a teeny bit more off this side” disease and OOPS, now my photo is too small. I end up wasting a lot of printer ink and paper in an effort to get the picture just right. Another problem I encounter is that I am well into my project and realize the paper I thought would work to mat a certain photo is ALL wrong and I have no substitute. Several months ago I taught you how to make oval scalloped frames and then crop the photo to perfectly match the frame in size and shape. Today I want to expand on that lesson to encompass an entire project. I will show you how you can edit your photos in the Inspiration Studio Software to print exactly the size you want for the frame or mat you have created. You can even save on ink by not printing the parts of the photo that you don’t need.
Every month I write an article for a web based magazine called Scrapbooking.com. I feature the Pazzles Inspiration and show a project that highlights one of the many amazing tools in the software. I always have the instructions to make the project included but only Craft Room members get the video tutorial and cutting files. The project was inspired by a wedding invitation I helped a friend create. The colors were from our very own Amanda's wedding; that's her and Josh in the photo! I loved it so much that I made a total of 5 cards for the video. This is one of those truly versatile cards that can work for almost any occasion.
Every time I think there are no more new features in the Inspiration Studio Pro software, I remember another cannot-be-missed tool. Such is the case with the Paper Texture feature found in the Color Palette window. Most of us already know that there are several libraries of Bazzil papers in different colors and textures. You can use them to fill your designs to get an idea of how your finished project will look. The designers at Pazzles use the fill on the images for the Craft Room image library to give them more dimension. But did you know that you can scan in other papers? This is especially useful for making Print and Cut projects.
I have to admit that I struggle with creating designs that have that free style informality that is so popular in designs recently. I tend to be a more smooth and symmetrical kind of gal. I like using the manual or hand vectorization to trace my clipart or to make my own original designs. I usually like to make sure all of my lines are straight and my curves are smooth. (Unlike my own body! :) ) Some might say I am a bit of a control freak. However………the new Freehand Draw tools in the Inspiration Studio Pro software might just get me to loosen up a bit. I admit it. I really like what I created for this lesson.
I would venture to guess that there are a lot of you that were into sewing in a previous crafting life. I know I used to sew all of my daughters’ clothes but they grew up and sewing clothes got expensive. I also discovered that scrapbook papers fed my love of all things patterned and colorful, so I haven’t done a lot of sewing in the past few years. I think that working on this fabric cutting tutorial has fanned that flame alive again and I will have to figure out where to make room for my new/old addiction! It was so exciting to see how well the Inspiration cut fabric that I had try as many kinds of fabric as I could find. Don’t misunderstand me, the Inspiration won’t cut every kind of fabric but it will cut so many of the commonly used ones that I can’t go to sleep at night without coming up with a new idea.
Lest you think I am the Special Effects Pro, let me state right away that the title does not refer to any 'super' powers I might have! However, the Inspiration Studio Pro software does make me feel like I am a pro at creating special effects with my cutter. Not only that but all the special effects tools are available to me with the click of a button.
Have you discovered the Photo Cut feature yet? Maybe you have stumbled across it in the Image menu and wondered what it was and how to use it. Often, when I mention Photo Cut, I get a puzzled look. It doesn’t take long for the puzzled look to turn into one of determination when that person begins to understand what it is. They become very determined to find a way to use it in their projects or home décor.
I remember the first time I figured out the welding feature in my cutting software. It was like magic to me; overlap two pieces- click WELD- and in seconds I had joined the letters together! No more gluing letters down one by one. No more punching and gluing ovals to make a flower. It was like falling in love- it consumed my every thought. A thousand creative ideas began to fill my waking (and sleeping) hours! I am sure you all can relate to how freeing that moment of discovery was. I experienced that excitement of discovery all over again when I got my Inspiration Studio Pro software and found the new welding tools. Better yet, they were all on the tool bar so I didn’t have to hunt them up in the menu anymore. WooHoo! They were standing like nice little soldiers in a row, just waiting for my command.
Are you a visual person? Do you need to SEE a project in order to know if the colors will work? I know that I am, and I can’t always ‘see’ those colors in my mind. Sometimes what I envision in my mind does not work well when translated to paper and pattern. By the time I have found the right colors for my photo or layout I usually have papers strewn all over my workspace. The Inspiration Studio Pro Software has a wonderful tool that gives me a good idea of what colors of paper I need to look for. This is saving me a lot of time and frustration in choosing papers for my layouts.
Are you like me; long on ideas but short on memory? I love creating designs with my Inspiration Studio software even if I won’t use them right away. I am a bit obsessive about saving them for future use. My problem is that I don’t “exactly” remember sometimes how they were supposed to go together!! Now, I have managed to get really SMART! It is such a good idea that I don’t know why I didn’t think of it sooner. When I want to save an example of how the pieces should be assembled, I use the Convert To Image function.
At some point in our journey to “Cutting Enlightenment” we all want to create a card or box. This usually occurs when we get beyond the simple single fold card and want to do something a bit more complicated. We are familiar with the scoring tools used by card makers: the ball tipped embossing tool, the bone folder and the scoring blade for the slicer/cutters. But what can be done with the Inspiration? Surely there is some nifty way to score fold lines with our amazing machine. In fact, I have come up with at least 9 different ways to score a fold line. It all depends on what look you want, what tool you have and how much time you want to spend on it. Let me try to explain all of your options, then it is up to you to decide which to use.
We all know we need to back up our files. I am sure you have heard the horror stories about computer crashes and stolen computers where some poor soul has lost all of their files. It isn't difficult to imagine how they feel. I would be devastated, especially if I lost all of my cutting designs! I couldn't possibly recreate them all again. With so many of us having laptops that go everywhere the potential for a catastrophe is even greater. Backing up your Inspiration Studio files is essential but finding all of those files can be a bit frustrating if you don't know where to look.
Piercing has been a decorative accent for a very long time. Think of punched tin pie safes and lanterns from days gone by. More recently, we have fallen in love with stitching through punched holes to make fun accents on our cards and pages. One particularly elegant look that has been a favorite in Europe is the art of piercing many tiny holes into vellum for a lacey look.
Have you ever had a project that seemed to cut by bouncing from one spot to another on the mat? First it cuts in the top right corner, bounces down to another corner, then back up to the middle and keeps moving back and forth. This is a very inefficient way to cut because it wastes time and energy.
An adorable holder that can be used two ways. This versatile candy holder that can be used to store small candies or to top a lollipop!