Two Card Project Tutorials a Cricut Post Pledge

I was thinking that those of you who don't own a Cricut Explore are probably thinking "Enough with the Explore-centric posts already!"  So, while I am whack-a-doodle over my new machine, I think it is very important to keep with our regularly scheduled programming!  I am going to continue posting about the fun I am having with my new machine but, whenever possible, I am going to try to include how the same projects can be created using a Cricut Expression.  Some of the projects may not be possible because they are "Make It Now" projects in Design Space, but I'm sure a lot can be made in CCR, with your Gypsy and by using your machine keypad. Alas, today's and my next couple of entries will be covering a few "Make it Now" and svg projects that I recently made so please bare with me. I'm going to get there soon.

Now to take care of some unfinished business.  Last week, I posted a couple of projects that I promised to discuss in later posts.  Two of which were Cricut Design Space "Make it Now" projects.  The first was this Happy Birthday Explosion Card:

To make it, you need an Explore.  Just click on the link above and you will be taken to the project screen which looks like this:

From here you will need to grab a mat, a couple of sheets of contrasting cardstock and hit "Make it Now" on the lower right of the page.  Next you will see this screen:

From here you will click "go", load your first sheet of card stock and follow the prompts to cut.  After the interior front flap rectangle is cut, you will unload your mat and the following screen will automatically load:

Next to the "Mat 2" thumbnail, there are 3 circles with images of a scissors, pen and scoring tool inside of them.  These icons mean that Explore will be doing 3 tasks during this stage of the project: cutting, scoring and writing.  However, the order of the icons does NOT reflect the order that the tasks will be completed.  When you load your paper, you will see this screen:

At the very top in the blue bar you will be instructed to insert your midnight pen into the accessory clamp on your Explore.  I missed this when I first did this project so I had to make a mental note to always check the blue bar for instructions when working in Design Studio. HINT - whenever you load your pen, put a piece of scratch paper under the accessory clamp so you don't accidentally write on your paper if you apply too much pressure.

Once the writing is completed, you will see the blue bar instructions change to insert the scoring stylus:

Once the scoring is done, (personally, I would have liked a deeper score.  I will do some research to see if you can increase the score pressure and let you know) Explore will automatically start cutting without any additional instructions or pauses.

The instructions to assemble the card can be found on the original project page on the lower right, but here they are if you are doing the project now.

Making this card was really simple once I had the hang of the "Make it Now" process. I got rave reviews from the card recipient who even asked if she could buy a few!  They are so simple to make - I gave them to her.

The next project I did from the "Make it Now" gallery was the Anna Griffin Butterfly Card

This is not a free project like the Happy Birthday card above.  I have the 3-month free subscription to the 25,000+ images and 200+ fonts that was included with the HSN Explore bundle and this card was included.

Honestly, the hardest part of this project is picking out the papers you want to use.  It took me over an hour to select my palette. I finally decided on a paper from Basic Gray Phoebe for the primary print and then picked matching cardstock.  Remember this collection??

When you open the Butterfly Card project you will see this screen. 


It includes a list of supplies you will need to make the card, a photo and the instructions for assembling it.  I work on a laptop, so I don't know if this is true on all monitors, but this pop up of the project does not fit into my screen and I am not able to scroll down to see the rest of the instructions, so I had to "zoom out" using the zoom option under the "View" drop down menu on the web browser.  If this happens to you, you can also hit "Ctrl" and "-" (the minus symbol on your numeric keypad) to zoom out.

When you select "Make It Now" on the lower right side, you will see the project on the mat briefly, then Design Space will move on to this screen automatically:

You will hit "Go", then follow the prompts on your machine and unload when the cut is complete.  Then the following screen will automatically load:

Again you will hit "Go", load your next mat and follow the prompts.  After Explore finishes this cut, you will unload and the next screen will appear:

Here you can see that there is a tiny scissors in a circle and a score tool inside of a circle next to the cut thumbnail in the "Mat 3" row on the left of the screen.  This means that you need to insert your scoring tool so the machine can do both operations.  You will not need to look for instructions on when to do this as Cricut will move from cutting to scoring without a pause.  If you do not have a scoring tool, the machine will move on to cutting without issue. (The previous 2 mats have scissors only which means that these images will cut only.) 

Once all of the pieces are cut, you will be returned to the initial project screen where you can find the assembly instructions on the right.  I have posted them here also.

As you can see, they are somewhat vague but I used the photograph to supplement.  I altered the element placement, used a sentiment from my stash and inserted a folded ribbon rather then the bow.

I can't wait to show you my next few projects that I made from  svgcuts.com.  I was delighted to learn that their projects work in Explore Design Space.  Check out this page to learn how to do this.  This video is also an excellent how-to!