Monday, March 26, 2018

Oh Cricut Maker, How I’m Going to love Thee!


You can I are going to be great friends, I can tell. This shiny new machine looks a little intimidating at first, especially since I had never worked with any type of Circuit machine before. When I opened up the lid on this beauty it’s as if I heard theme music in the background, OK maybe I’m being just a little over dramatic but I was just a little excited.
The Cricut peeps, sent me all kinds of goodies to use with my Cricut Maker but I thought I should take BABY STEPS and use the beginner materials that came with my machine. The beginner project was a little “Smile” card with a kite.  Supplies that came with the machine: white card stock, blue card stock and a small swatch of plaid fabric.
Now in order to get started I had to do just a few things first.
  •  I had to make space for my machine and make sure there was clearance all around my Cricut Maker so that the mats would not bump into anything. Now that was harder than I thought but I worked it out.
  • I had to get my computer in place so that I could view it and my maker at the same time; this too was a little tricky. The machine has a set up where you can sit an IPad on top to make this a non-issue.  (My husband is not going to be too happy when I tell him that my new machine will not work without an new IPad. Hey if he doesn’t have to know about the fabric in my trunk, he doesn’t have to know about this either!)
  • I had to tear my house apart looking for a USB cord to connect my computer to the Maker. This did not come with the machine.
  • I had to download the program to my computer from the official Cricut website and that was easy.

After everything was in place I just followed the step by step project instructions for setting up the machine and creating this project. All I had to do was pick the sample project, load the paper into the maker and let it do it's job of drawing and cutting all the pieces for the project.  I used the regular blade that was already installed in the maker for this paper project. There are a few folds here and there and a little gluing involved but that was it and it was a piece of cake. 

The machine worked lovely! Adding and removing the pens and changing the blades was easy-peazy! The Cricut Design Space has tons of free projects to get you started or test your skills. This is great foe beginners like myself who need to test the waters and learn everything that is possible wit create with your Cricut. Once you get a handle on what you're doing you can create your own projects and share them with the community.

Some myths that I had about using a Cricut machines.
  •  I thought Cricut machines were only for paper products FALSE: In comes the Cricut Maker, designed to cut fabrics.
  • I thought the user manual would be this big thick book and I would have to schedule time to read it. FALSE: It was seriously thin because the machine it not complicated at all. Everything clicks together so easily, and the blades are not a hassle to install.
  • I Thought I had to put pieces together.  FALSE:I was pleasantly surprised that she was ready to go from the box.
  • I thought you applied spray adhesive to make your projects stick to the mats. FALSE: that mats already have adhesives on them, to hold your materials. There are all types of mats for different projects and different materials. They also have a film that you put over the adhesive when they are not in use. The mats that I will put to use the most will definitely be the fabric mats!
  • I thought all the mats were all  small  FALSE: The larger fabric mats I have are 12X24
  • I didn’t know that Cricut sold fabrics

 After I made my little card that I considered myself a professional, so why not try out one of the projects from the Cricut Design Space. I picked the stuffed Globe project because it was really cool and it would be a great additional to a child’s room.  
I decided to use denim, my fabric of choice for the globe background and a black and white gingham plaid for the continents. The maker worked beautifully cutting out the denim and all the odd shapes, now I just need to figure out how to place all the continents where they belong…… That’s for day two, so stay tuned.


This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Cricut. The opinions and text are all mine.



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2 comments

  1. Cant wait to see what else you going to do with this machine.

    ReplyDelete

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