Drawing on Wooden Discs with the Silhouette Curio™

Hello,  This week I've been using my Silhouette Curio™ to decorate blank wooden discs over on the Silhouette UK Blog.  I used some flat wooden disks from Hobbycraft, a pack of the new Silhouette Sketch pens and my Silhouette Curio™.  

My instructions show how to make a template for accurate placement of the designs onto the discs, which would also work for engraving as well as drawing.

WHAT YOU'LL NEED

Flat Wooden Discs (1.5"/3.8cm circles)

Silhouette Sketch Pens in Brown (NEW Naturals)

Silhouette Curio™ with Regular-sized Base and Cutting Mat

Silhouette Chipboard, or thick card

Downloaded Seaside Designs (#27917, #84503, #46674, #43866 or similar)

Small Drawstring Bag in Canvas or Hessian


I made sufficient of the discs so that they could be used to play the following games

1. For a simple Snap/Pairs game:
Two or more sets with a minimum of one set of designs for each player. Lay out an equal number of discs face down in a grid pattern in front of each player. Take turns to reveal one disc, and the player who calls snap correctly when a pair is revealed keeps the pair. The winner is the player with the most discs when one player has no discs left.

2. For a Matching Activity (for a younger child):
Making a larger number of discs with a single design, print out a complete set of the discs on paper and laminate (I used a simple screen shot).

I placed the finished discs in a small hessian drawstring bag to complete the rustic look.

Tag Card made with the Silhouette FREE file - Peace and Love

Hiya, I've made a sweet peace and love card today using the Floral Valentine Tag. The tag, complete with Print and Cut rose is the current free file in the Silhouette Design store.  However, its only free until the early hours of tomorrow morning (Tuesday 14th February, around 07:00 am GMT).

You can find details on how I made the card over on the Silhouette UK Blog, and you'll see that I made this despite having NO pink card in my stash!

An extra work-around was my dark 'pink' glitter paper, for heart and 'pegs'. It wasn't pink AT ALL - just silver glitter paper coloured pink with a Copic Alcohol marker (R39, Garnet). Do you use your alcohol markers for that purpose too?

I have entered this card into the following challenges:
Come and Get It Challenge - Love is in the Air
Glitter N' Sparkle Challenge - #226 Love Is In The Air

New Digital Papers

Hello,

Do you use digital papers and elements in your Silhouette projects? I LOVE them and especially love using the digital papers in the Silhouette Studio® software.  It is great to be able to add papers to the library and to rescale the patterns to suit my projects. 

I was very excited to see that Snap Click Supply Co. had digital files available from a new designer last week; Down This Road - Designs by Angie.

These are some of the digital paper packs that jumped into my shopping basket.

Flurries of Fun Papers

Star Quality Papers

{Phone}omenal Papers

Love You 2 Pieces Papers

Aren't they fabulous? I love that they come with the solid papers too - a ready-made colour pallet.

Here is the first set I've downloaded, sitting in my (pre-cloud) Library.

Here I'm preparing a colour swatch, colour-picking extra colours from one of the pattered papers. I save the swatches in the 'My Own Designs' folder in the library.  I can then open the swatch directly into my project and recolour just about any design to match my digital papers.

I'll be sharing some completed projects that I make with these papers soon. Promise.

Glitter Unicorn Card

Sometimes I feel simple is best in card making. This simple card design relies on glimmer, shine and glitter and really shows off this adorable unicorn SVG file.  I made this magical card using this week's new SVG release from Sanqunetti Design - Unicorn SVG.

The only additions I made to the unicorn design are the child's name and the cloud/rainbow element from this Rainbow Sloth card.

Supplies Used

Silhouette Cameo® and Colour Printer
6" circular card blank (cut on Silhouette Cameo®)
Off-White Pearl/Glimmer Paper (printable)
White heavy-weight Cardstock
Silver Glitter Paper (for the rainbow)
Double-sided Adhesive Paper (apply over mane, tail & star)
Semi-opaque Glitter (applied to the adhesive paper)
Black Vinyl (unicorn's features)
Silver Brushed-metal Vinyl (for name and horn stripes)
Grey Marker (or scrap of grey paper for the horn)
Card adhesive
Dimensional adhesive pads

I cut the majority of the unicorn pieces using the Silhouette's Print and Cut facility and then paper-pieced it, added the glitter (on machine cut pieces of double-sided adhesive), and then vinyl, and finally popped it up on dimensional adhesive pads.

The Unicorn cutting file is available from the Sanqunetti Design website and at Judy's Etsy store.


I made several versions of the card, but I really like this one, the simplest, best of all.

Rainbow Sloth Card

I quickly made this card from a recent release from Sanqunetti Design - the Rainbow Sloth SVG. To speed up the process I used the Silhouette's Print and Cut capability - a real time-saver.

This allowed me to print and cut all the pieces from white card. The colours were selected by using the Fill Tool and and the eye dropper, picking the colours from the enclosed jpg file (temporarily copied in to the Design View). 

The only additions were the sentiment and the spotted background, which was a pattern fill included with the Silhouette Design software.

The features were rather small on this design and instead of attempting to cut and adhere them using card, paper or vinyl, I subtracted them from the face and eye mask and placed a black face shape behind to make the features show up.  This technique saves losing tiny pieces and ensures they are place just where they were intended to be!

The Rainbow Sloth SVG file is available from the Sanqunetti Design store.

Bear Pocket Bags - Combining Felt and Flocked Heat Transfer

Hello Janet here again.
Today I'm sharing a felt project with you over on the Silhouette UK Blog, turning a paper pocket file into a cute felt bag.  It also includes instructions for a no-sew technique for adding fine details to ANY felt project.

Many of the files in the Silhouette Design Store, designed to be used for paper, can be made into felt projects. Felt cuts much more easily on the Silhouette CAMEO®3 if it is first backed with a stabiliser. I used the Silhouette Clean Cut  Fusible Fabric Stabiliser, rather than the Cut and Sew type, as this project wouldn't require any machine sewing. In fact, it requires no sewing at all.

For detailed instructions on how to cut felt backed with stabiliser I recommend that you read my recent post on the Silhouette  UK blog called Cutting Felt with Cameo®3.  I also recommend using a wool/viscose felt mix, rather than a completely synthetic felt. Not only does it cut more easily, but it retains its softness and dimension, whereas synthetic felt can, once pressed, compress and fuse with the layer beneath, losing depth and texture.

In order to make the smaller and more detailed pieces I used my favourite cheat - Flocked Heat Transfer Material. Once incorporated into the the project its velvety texture looks like felt, but more intricate cuts can be made with a level of detail not possible from felt.


What You'll Need
Felt Sheets in Brown Shades (preferably a  30% wool, 70% viscose blend)
Cotton Fabric for Lining
Fusible Fabric Stabiliser (Clean Cut)
Black Flocked Heat Transfer Material 
Iron (on a non-steam setting)
Fabric Adhesive (Beacon Fabri-tac is my favourite)
Ribbon, Cord, or Similar (for a strap)
Downloaded file Bear Hug Candy Pocket by J M Rush (#172324)
Downloaded Bow File, I used (#16778) by Alaa' K

The file's designer, J M Rush, gives full instructions on how to make up the pocket. These instructions can be accessed in 3 ways:

• From the file's details in the Silhouette Design Store,
• Using the Show Properties facility in your software Downloads Library, and
• Directly from this link.

I hope you like these cute bears, I loved making them and LOVE my Silhouette too!

Love is in the Air - Valentine Card with the FREE File

Hiya, Today I have made a Valentine's card using this week's FREE file from the Silhouette Design Store - the Love Is In The Air phrase, Design #176413.  I couldn't resist taking it up into the skies!

WHAT YOU'LL NEED:

• Silhouette CAMEO® orPortrait®
• White Printable Cardstock
• Grey Heavyweight Pearl Cardstock
• Vellum
• Card Adhesive
• Adhesive Foam Pads
• Glossy Accents or similar
• Silhouette Adhesive Corrugated Paper
• Love Is In The Air file download by Silhouette #176413
• Amazing Plane by Echo Park file download #125012
• Cloud Borders file downloads #2320 #173527

Here are my construction steps:

1. Make a rectangular card base in grey heavy-weight pearl cardstock in the Silhouette Design software.
2. Adhere a large rectangle of white corrugated paper to the card base.
3. In the software set up a Print and Cut page and arrange the plane elements to fit into a white rectangle. Add coloured frames or strips as required.  Add cut lines to the outside of the rectangle.
4. Ungroup the quote and rearrange it to follow the line of the banner.
5. Copy the plane and banner and add cut lines around the outside.
6. Print and then cut out the elements on your Silhouette.
7. Cut cloud borders from vellum (I used regular and pearlised vellum).
8. Adhere the rectangles to the card with card adhesive.
9. Adhere the smaller elements to the card with adhesive foam pads.
10. Adhere the vellum cloud pieces obscuring the adhesive behind decorative strips of card or tuck the ends under the rectangular pieces.
11. Add some glossy accents to the hearts.
12. Card complete!

This makes for a fun valentine card.  You can change out the colours or materials for a more masculine or feminine look.

The Love Is In The Air design is available free in the Silhouette Design store for one week from 30th January 2017.

Technical Alert !! For these photos I've been experiementing with a light box. I'm finding it difficult to getting a nice sharp focus. Apologies if this spoils your viewing. Do you ever have photo problems?

Challenges Entered:
Crafting By Designs - February Anything Goes
Crafty Creations Challenges - #334 February Anything Goes 
Glitter N' Sparkle - #226 Love is in the Air