Happy Black Friday!
It's black Friday! Whether you are getting up before the sun to beat the rush, just got home after braving the crowds, or decided to play it safe and stay home we are glad you decided to spend part of your day with us!
Recent Posts
Gobble Til U Wobble
This two page layout by Melinda Beltran really says it all. The family is all with us. We have worked hard preparing the feast that is in front of us. The only thing left is to Gobble away baby, Gobble away. I am sure you will all agree Melinda has an awesome gift when it come to paper piecing.
Installing CDs into your Image ...
When we designed the Inspiration we also took the opportunity to redesign our software. Pazzles software has always been the leader in the industry, but we wanted to try and make it even better.
Engraving Tool Discoveries
I just finished creating a new tutorial video on the Engraving Tool. I will admit that when I was asked to show examples of different materials that can be engraved I was not too excited. It is the holidays after all and I have plenty of projects to do already. However, despite my grumblings, I found that I had embarked on a journey of discovery. I could not believe the different materials that I found to engrave on. Initially, I think most of us would agree that the first materials that come to mind are metal and glass. But did you know that you can also engrave on plastics, acrylics, wood and paper?
Traditions
We only have a few days until Thanksgiving. All of us are working hard to make sure we have everything prepared and have taken care of those last minute details for the big day. I think some of us stress out so much because we know that once Thanksgiving is here Christmas is just a hop, skip and a jump away. We can lose sight of how special the day is. Growing up I can remember all the wonderful traditions we had.
Week Wrap Up
Another week has come and gone, and the holiday season is upon us! In between the family visits, turkey cooking, shopping and gift wrapping we hope you find some time to enjoy all the great gifts we have for you here at the Craft Room!
Happy Birthday Monkey card
I don't know about you guys but I am a very tactile person. I love to feel and touch. ( I was always being told as a child " we look with our eyes not our hands".) That is why digital scrap booking is not my cup of tea. I love how paper feels and smells.
Mini Albums
Mini albums are wonderful way to commemorate a special event, topic or someone. They make great gifts and coffee table books too! This week we took our own spin on albums using a design created by our very own Lisa. These little mini albums close shut by themselves using a short flap and slightly resemble a matchbook in shape. These were so much fun to do and we all took very different approaches to the project.
Loading your mat
I get an array of calls throughout the week with questions about the Inspiration. While some of the questions are easy—or easy to me because I use it almost daily. I have to step back and remember that there are a lot of Inspiration users out there with a very wide scale of expertise and knowledge levels. I think it’s interesting that just this week I got a question on how to load the mat. I thought to myself that it’s been almost two years since I started using the Inspiration. I also remember my first time using it here in our craft room and being a bit nervous.
Color My World
Are you an "8 crayon box" person or do you need the mega box with 128 colors? I am definitely a "128 crayon box" person and believe me I will use every single one! Whether you work with only a few colors or the whole rainbow, eventually you will need to use the color palette tools to design your project When you first use your Inspiration software you probably find the color palette window just a little bit annoying. It might seem like it is always in the way and wonder why it needs to be front and center all of the time. Then comes the day when you have an epiphany and realize that this box is the portal to a world of color magic.
Holiday Gift Ideas
The holidays are right around the corner. We are all very lucky that we have such an amazing machine that helps us make an array of different presents, decorations and holiday greeting cards.
We are ready!
The time has finally come for the Pazzles Craft Room to go public! We are so excited to share this site with the crafting community and hope you will love what we have here.You guys are what make this place really special and we can't wait to grow this community!
Boys
In our society it seems to be a girls world. Girls have tons of things to choose from whereas boys are left with far less options. You can find 10 different cute outfits for girls while only 2 for boys. It is no different in the scrapbook industry. There are tons of girl geared papers and embellishments and only a few for boys.
Missing Tool Bars!
Have you ever accidentally closed a tool bar and cannot figure out how to get it back again? They are really easy to bring back up as long as you know where to look! Here’s how to bring up the different tool bars in your software...
Cards
Sometimes I think we can get so wound up in all of the many things that the Creative Cutter can do that we forget how much easier even simple tasks are with the Creative Cutter. Of course I love paper piecing designs and cute titles just as much as the next person. But don’t forget that you can make perfectly proportioned window cards, tags of any size with a perfectly centered circle hole, or cards of any unique dimension!
What is that thingy you ...
Have you had trouble getting your friends and family to understand what exactly electronic cutting is? Do they kind of look at you blankly when you get excited about it? I know mine do and it is so frustrating. The men will ask my husband, “So are you and your wife still doing that CRAFT thing?” and you get the feeling they are thinking potholders or macramé. The women will try to compare it to a printer or worse yet, (ugh!!) .....STICKERS!!
Something New Every Day
Here at the Craft Room we are really starting to settle in to our routine and it is becoming increasingly clear that the Craft Room is an addictive place to be! With new blogs every day, new projects, lots to talk about in the forums, videos to watch, projects to share, and cutting files to download you can find something new here every day!
Aloha Scrapbook Page
I love the way a scrapbook page can take us back every time we look at it. Or the page has the same ability to take a person on the journey who was not there to begin with. I have always wanted to go somewhere tropical like Hawaii or St Maarten. With winter just around the corner and our fall being colder than ever I look for comfort and warmth in those past photographs and scrapbook pages.
Inspiration Sound
Every once in a while I get a question about why the Inspiration makes noise when it cuts and how to turn it off. We are busy people and often that means finishing up projects late at night while the kids are sleeping. I understand that having a whisper quiet machine can be very handy, but I wanted to take the opportunity to explain why the Inspiration makes sound as it cuts.
Gadgets, Gadgets, Everywhere!
Recently, Tatum wrote about the Inspiration to Go software that allows you to create and save projects without being connected to the Inspiration cutter. My husband and I travel by car quite a bit and I have developed an affinity for gadgets that allow my creative juices to flow even while on the road. The Inspiration to Go software is the pivot point for all my other ‘geeky’ devices. Allow me to give you some tips on how to get the most out of your Inspiration to Go software while traveling.
How Do Your Friends Inspire ...
This past week our team at Pazzles created tags for one of our upcoming featured projects. I decided I wanted to try my hand at making a dimensional rose. In my eyes, I'm still a pretty green in the crafting world. There are just so many different mediums and tools, I feel like every week I am running to my friends to have the explain to me how to use something.
Clipboards
How about spicing up your every day tasks with a little creativity and your Pazzles machine? That's what we at Pazzles decided to do and we certainly had a lot of fun! I think choosing "favorites" out of all the projects we do would be far too difficult but this one would certainly be up there!
Final Polishing
We are now a month in to beta and almost all aspects of the website are receiving some final polishing. We are so excited to see all of our hard work pay off and plan to continue adding and expanding on this already wonderful site! In case you missed it, here is what went on at the Craft Room this week.
Mini Pages
Have you ever wanted to purchase something and decided not to, but afterward you can't stop thinking about it! I have had that problem with so many of your projects. Unfortunately I can only pick one each week