Cricut Cake Machine Cutting Mat

Cricut has two new tools to use with your Cricut Cake Machine to help you create fantastic projects. The Cricut Cake Machine Cutting Mat comes in two sizes, 12 X 12 and 12 X 24. These wonderful mats are constructed from clear, durable plastic and feature easy to follow measurement lines. The two sizes gives you, the decorator, more options when sizing images and phrases to your particular cake. They are priced $11.99 for the smaller one and $15.99 for the larger size through the company, and are a must have for your cake decorating set up.

The decorator first lays out and rolls flat a section of gum paste. This is then laid onto the cutting mat, matching it up with the measurement lines, depending on type and size. The design is chosen on the machine and the mat is inserted. When the machine begins working, it lays out and cuts the design for you. When done, the mat is removed and you pull away the unwanted edges around the cut. The phrase or design is left behind, and you can lift and place on the cake as planned. The entire process takes only minutes and is extremely user friendly. Decorating has never been easier for the beginner crafter.

In the past, it would take years of experience to do lettering and constructing intricate swirls and flourishes. Pastry bags, custom templates, and a keen eye were required, along with an extended period of practice time. Now, there is no other reason for you to have to dream of being able to do work like this. With these tools, your options for decorating cakes and cupcakes are unlimited as your imagination. Using the Cricut Cake 12×24 Cutting Mat in combination with the other tools, you can create in minutes and with as much beauty as any professional.

Scrapbook Room Ideas and Themes

Scrapbook Room Ideas abound on the internet, but not only that, in magazines as well. There are several publications now available which are dedicated to providing art, craft and scrapbook room ideas. As well, if you take a look at any crafty type of magazine, even if it’s not your area, you will still find things that can be used for scrapbook room ideas.

When looking for scrapbook room ideas, keep track of the ones that pop out to you. If you find them in a magazine, tear out the page and keep it in a folder. Put a label on the folder and call it “Scrapbook Room Ideas that I Like.” When finding things that catch your eye on the internet, save the image to a virtual folder and label it the same way. When you’ve gathered enough ideas, you can easily print them all out and then add them to your paper folder.

Finding your style can be figured out quite easily by taking a cursory look through your file folder. Go through the folder and take another look at each image. Do you love it? Yes? Then keep it. If you don’t love it, then set it aside or toss it. Look at the rest of the scrapbook room ideas and ask yourself if they are doable in your space. Can you afford the furniture shown in a particular photo? If you can’t, but you are still inspired by the piece or think you can get the look easily, keep it. If not, get rid of that photo and so on until you are left with only those pieces that a.) you absolutely love and b) are doable for your space.

What is your style? When looking through your “Scrapbook Room Ideas that I Like” folder, think about color that gravitates towards you. You may find a theme. You may notice that everything in the folder is white and pink accents with a sea foam green wall color. If so, maybe your style is Shabby Chic or maybe it is a Romantic style. Take your folder with you when you go shopping. Figuring out your style, likes and dislikes will go a long way in helping you come up with scrapbook room ideas that you can use in your home.

The Broad Spectrum of Cricut Cartridges

Cricut electronic cutters are known for their versatility and this versatility comes from the wide range of cartridges available for the machines. Cartridges are an essential part of how the Cricut machines work. The machines won’t even work when there is no cartridge installed. This is why each machine comes with it’s own cartridge already included, so you can start rafting with the machine right away. Of course, crafters get bored very quickly and that one cartridge will soon begin to wear out it’s usefulness. That’s why there are tons of cartridges available to buy separately, to increase the uses of your machine. Whenever you get bored of one cartridge you can simply choose another one from the range, eventually building up a collection of cartridges for every occasion. Every cartridge is fully compatible with each machine, including the larger favorite, the Cricut Expression

There are 5 different categories of cartridges. There are licensed cartridges, shape cartridges, font cartridges, Classmate cartridges, and Solutions cartridges. Within each section, crafters are sure to find cartridges that increase their use of their Cricuts and add spice to their scrapbooking experience.

Font cartridges each contain enough designs to print the entire alphabet, allowing you to build whatever phrases and words you wish. Also, some cartridges feature more than one font and some include shapes and patterns to match the font. Fonts range from whimsical and cute to basic and practical. The most popular font cartridges include the All Mixed Up, Ashlyn’s Alphabet, and the brilliant Opposites Attract cartridge.

Shape cartridges differ from font cartridges in that they contain images and shapes rather than fonts. For example, Wild Card contains shapes you might need to create stylish cards and envelopes. The Pagoda cartridge is another such cartridges containing useful images for a wide range of uses, which will be evident in its name.

Another type of cartridge is the licensed Cricut cartridge. Unlike other cartridges these may not only contain only a font or only shapes. They usually contain a mixture of both, often focused around a central franchise. These themes include popular characters like Hannah Montana and Disney princesses, and contain images and fonts associated with them.

The Cricut Classmate Cartridges are designed to be especially useful to teachers, teaching assistants, art technicians and anyone else who has the need to construct bulletin boards and classroom aids. The people at Cricut know that these people often have needs of their own and have created this range especially. For geography teachers there is 50 States. Primary school teachers might enjoy using the Cursive 101 cartridge. Whether it is a bulletin board you are creating or a classroom display, this range is great at supplying teacher with designs specific to them.

Finally, the Solutions line of Cricut cartridges has been designed for scrapbookers on a budget. These cartridges may not carry the wide range of designs and features seen on the other cartridges but they are available for a much lower cost. Nearly all cartridges carry an MSRP of around ninety dollars, but Solutions cartridges are available for around the fifty dollar mark. As with other cartridge lines there are many to choose from, including wedding and birthday themes.

The advantage of owning a Cricut cutting machine has always been their incredible versatility. The cartridge system allows you to quickly adapt and increase the designs you are able to create. New cartridges are regularly released meaning that this evolution is ongoing. It’s no wonder that Cricut machines are often named as the most adaptable machines on the market. For more information on Cricut products, including where to find a cheap Cricut Gypsy be sure to check out Cartridge Helper.

Simply Sweet Cricut Cartridge Offers Pleasing Fonts

Simply Sweet Cricut Cartridge is the new font system released in July 2009 by Provo Craft, manufacturer of paper crafting products. Eagerly awaited by crafters everywhere, the Simply Sweet cartridge is a whimsical addition to font libraries. Its style is young-at-heart, and reproduces child-like letters, numbers, shapes, icons, and more. Creator of an entire range of products that promote paper crafting, Provo Craft Cricut cartridges are compatible with its three cutting machines. Users do not need a computer for this product.

Simply Sweet offers a variety of easy-to-use features. Among these are letters, numbers, common punctuation marks, icons, and phrases. The letters are in upper and lower case. Three of the all purpose phrases are “Birthday” “Congrats”, and “Get Well Soon”. The shapes included are circles, hearts, flowers, stars, a birthday gift box, butterfly, and diaper safety pin. A stitched circle and heart are also available. Other font features include tab, blocked, shadow, and blockout effects. Paired with the original Cricut machine, Simply Sweet Cricut Cartridge can produce colorful letters from 1″ to 5.5″ in height and 11.5” in length. If used with the Cricut Expression machine, it produces fonts up to 24″.

This new font cartridge can be used for a variety of crafting projects. Scrappers will find it a fun addition that will provide children’s themes to pages. Photos of a child’s birthday party can be enhanced with the fun and colorful font images. For card crafters, the font system can complement get well, congratulatory, and birthday occasions as well. Cards for newborns can be decorated with these innocent and care free images. Early childhood teachers and others can accent bulletin boards to creatively offer information to staff and parents.

The Simply Sweet Cricut Cartridge is sold directly through Provo Craft, or by a variety of craft retailers and is fully compatible with the cheap Cricut Gypsy and the cheap Cricut Juke Box.

Masquerade Ball Masks – An Overview

Pretty much everyone agrees that the masquerade ball mask originated in Italy in the 11th century as a form to achieve anonymity at a carnival or ball where, in theory, it would be possible for the aristocracy and commoners to mingle together. These balls, as well as the masks, spread from Italy to France, England and eventually the United States where they are still used in celebrations such as Mardi Gras. These days, masquerade masks are considered glamorous, trendy and very fashionable especially for use as favors in weddings, costume balls. They can be half masks, which simply covers the eyes, part of the nose and the forehead, full masks, which cover the entire face, head masks which cover the entire head and stick masks which cannot be used for true masquerade purposes as they are not held onto the face by any means other than your own hand.

There are many masquerade ball mask (also known as venetian ball masks) makers all over the world, each of them making masks in his or her own unique style. Materials used to make masks include feathers, beads, glitter, sequins and paint. Masquerade masks come in many different shapes based on the mask type. For instance, the ‘gatto’ or cat mask resembles a half-mask shaped like a cat. A nose mask has a large nose attached to it and is also based of the half-mask form.

When buying a masquerade ball mask, be sure to look for a quality base. A flimsy plastic base will not hold up for a very long time and you might find yourself out a good amount of money when it rips. A traditional masquerade mask would be made out of paper mache but this can be stiff and heavy therefore very uncomfortable to wear although the effect is generally stunning. A good compromise for the base is fabric. It is durable and comfortable.

Masquerade masks are timeless and alluring. They create an instant statement and a good mask can be used time and time again. Do your research before buying one and you’ll be able to enjoy it for years to come.

Enjoy Your Home More By Adding Inexpensive Art

Adding art to your home doesn’t have to cost a fortune (unless you really want it to).  Finding inexpensive art is not hard to do and can easily make your home a more enjoyable place.  You can turn your house into your own little art gallery without breaking the bank with some simple tips that I’ll offer in this post. One type of art you can get is glass art.

Glass art is not expensive at all.  The most common type is fused glass which comes from melting sheets or pieces of glass together into a new shape.  You can get fused glass plates, bowls, and wall art.  Blown glass is also very popular, but a bit more expensive that the fused type.  The best thing about using glass to decorate your home is that it will never deteriorate, and if you can keep from dropping it or knocking it over it can be passed down through many generations.

Local artists will also sell their works very inexpensively.  This is especially true when you have an up and coming artist that is working really hard to build up their name.  They will sell their pieces for a small fraction of what you’d pay for a big name artist, and the quality will be nearly the same.  There are probably some art galleries in your town that you can check out, or find them on the web.

Reprints of classics is also a big business.  There are paper reprints of classic works that can be purchased for just a few bucks, or you can find someone who will repaint it for you.  This works especially well when there is a master work that you’re absolutely in love with and want to have it in your home.

Finding art such as glass art for your home is not tough at all.  Just be sure to set a budget before heading out because it’s very easy to get carried away! If it helps, do some research online first to help give you an idea of what you want. From there, you can decide to stick to certain types of art in order to prevent from over spending. It’s easy to be sucked into the beauty of a lot of these different types of art pieces and although they can sometimes be a good investment, you still want to be careful about how you spend your money. In any case, glass art or any other type of art can really help enhance the look of your home.

Homemade Craftiness

Whatever the occasion, birthday, Christmas or an anniversary home-made arts and craft items make delightful gifts.  Anything home-made proves to the receiver that you have spent time thinking about them and what they might like. Craft boxes can be made from many materials and there are many craft books available that can give tips on making them.  If you are a total beginner, then perhaps a ready-made box that you decorate yourself is the way to start your craft career. Ready-made boxes are available in a variety of materials.  Wooden boxes are an ideal starting point as they are sturdy enough for a child or adult to decorate and provide a hard surface on which to draw, paint or stick things on to. Cardboard is a second option and they too are suitable to decorate in a variety of different ways.

Buying Baby Shower Cards

Many people buy baby shower cards along with baby shower gifts. However, more creative people make their own. The simplest way to do this is to fold a piece of cardstock in half. Draw a picture appropriate to the occasion on the front. Write a nice message on the inside, thinking of creative ways to welcome the baby or congratulate the parents. Scrapbookers like to adorn the outside of the card with stickers and embellishments from their craft. Others use the computer to make a card. Programs like Print Shop include templates, fonts, and art to be used in cards to simplify the process. Cards made in these ways show an extra measure of love for the recipient of the gift and are greatly appreciated.

How Does Digital Portrait Photography Work?

Digital portrait photography is described as the taking of photographs posed by individuals using digital cameras. Digital portrait photography captures the likeness of individuals. Accordingly, the focus is more on the expression and face of the object/individual. Portrait photography also involves the taking of set scenery photographs. In portrait photography, the aim of the photographer is to capture and display the personality, mood, likeness and most importantly the essence of a subject. Facial/up close shots, upper body shots and environmental shots are types of portrait photography. Compared to other photography styles, unskilled models are chosen as the subjects. Accordingly, family occasions such as wedding parties and graduation are selected for digital portrait photography. Portrait photography is created for both private and commercial (public) display. For instance, authors use their portrait on the jacket of their books.

photo credit: Sylvain Labeste

The style is popular with novices as well as seasoned digital photographers. Ordinary individuals have also taken to liking digital photography as it guarantees good quality photos. There are different techniques used in digital portrait photography. However, individuals are advised to try capturing the eyes and face of the subject in sharp focus but render the background in soft focus.

Lighting is an integral component of portrait photography. Light makes the difference between classy quality portrait photographs and not-so-good photographs. Seasoned portrait photographers are able to manipulate light so as to achieve the desired results. One type of lighting that helps to clearly bring out the details as well as the 3 dimensionality of the features of the subject is what is described as three point lighting. Three point lighting makes use key, fill and rim lighting. When taking portrait photographs, key light also referred to as the main light, is placed either to the right or left of object/subject. The fill light is placed opposite the main light. This light softens shadows created by the main light on the face of the subject. These side lights allow for powerful photos to be captured as they hide or highlight the facial features of the subject thereby creating mood and texture. On the other hand, rim light, also known as hair or backlight, is placed right behind the subject/object. Rim light is included so as to highlight the hair and shoulders of the subject thereby separating it from the background.

When taking portrait photographs, one very crucial tip is that the photographer should have an interest and be enthusiastic about their subjects. This is the only way they can be able to take quality portraits.