Design Studio Updates

Wondering how to update your Cricut Design Studio Program?

Check out how to get the latest updates on cartridges and more by clicking HERE.

Just download those and run them.  You should be good to go.  I do not think the new Teddy Bear cartridge is available yet for Design Studio.  It is in the Cricut Craft Room, though.
Frightful Affair and Quilted Christmas are available, though.

Hope this helps!

Want to see more of my projects?
Click HERE to see my gallery!
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Design Studio and Gypsy Updates Ready!

The long awaited Cricut Design Studio and Gypsy updates are ready!  The following 18 new release cartridges have been added:

Flower Shoppe
Fancy Frames
Robot Party
Makeup Party
Princess Party
Space Party
Word Collage
Sweet Tooth Boxes
Creative Memories Traveler
Summer Celebrations
Autumn Celebrations
Phrases
Teresa Collins Sophisticated
Ornamental Iron 2
County Fair Lite
Love You a Latte
Sweet Shop
Recess
9 Months

To update your Gypsy, run the Cricut Sync Program on your computer with the Gypsy hooked up.  If you don't have the Cricut Sync Program, head over HERE to download it.

To update your Design Studio, head over HERE where one of my BFFs, Diane, has very detailed and clear instructions.

Want to see more of my projects? Click HERE to see my gallery!

Subscribe to Obsessed with Scrapbooking to learn more about ways to use the Cricut in your scrapbooking!

New Design Studio and Gypsy Update! Also, Halloween Crop with Gypsy Giveaway, New Sneak Peeks of Mini-Cartridges, and more!

Have you heard? There's a new update for the Design Studio software! You can see the new Destinations cartridge on the Design Studio update also! Woo Hoo! Click HERE to update your Design Studio software! AND, be sure and update your Gypsy because there is a new update for it also!!




Secondly, check out the above photo and then click HERE to register to win a Gypsy, Gobe Battery Pack, Your Story and more when the Christmas with the Cricut hosts a Spooktacular Halloween live Ustream event on Friday, October 30!!

Thirdly, how about some sneak peeks of the new Winter Cricut Mini-Cartridges?? Click HERE to see some great projects that Melanie, Tammy and I made for the Christmas with the Cricut blog!



And finally, how about a quick pic of the new Destinatiions cartridge? As always, images may change and are property of Provocraft! Linda, over at the Just A Scrappin' blog, posted the screen shots of this cartridge - click HERE to see them! Thanks, Linda!!

Cricut Lyrical Letters You're The Best card with cut files

I made this welded frame, bird and "You're the Best" design in the Cricut Design Studio since I thought it would make a handy front for a card. All the pieces are from the Lyrical Letters cartridge. The card I made is actually 6x6 but you could get away with 5x5 or even 5.5x5.5, if you prefer. I would probably give this to someone by hand, rather than mailing, since square cards are more expensive to mail. Another choice is to make a rectangular envelope instead to save on postage. I am not normally too concerned with postage but a square card is almost TWICE the price to mail.

I used My Minds Eye papers - love that they are two sided and coordinating. I inked the edges to distress it even more. Then, I pop dotted the front from the base. All in all, though, a very simple card.

I made the cut file in two sizes, for Baby Bug/Create owners and then for Expression owners.

For the Expression owners, click HERE to download the cut file.

For Baby Bug/Create owners, click HERE to download the cut file.

Enjoy and let me know if you make anything with this!

Cricut Simply Sweet Baby Card with cut files

I decided to use Design Studio to create some baby word art to go on a card. The cartridge already had the "Love" with a Heart on it so I just added the Baby and the diaper pin. I made the cut file of this word art, including the shadowing around it, for both Expression and Baby Bug owners.

I used some American Crafts cardstock for the purple and pink areas and then the Glitter 4x6 Mat Stack (seen below) for the rest of the card. That little mat stack has a TON of cute papers that are just perfect for card making! I added some Stickles on the Baby Love and diaper pin in white (can't remember which white, though..oops!). I also inked around the edges with purple (wisteria) chalk ink and popped up the word art layer. Want to see something interesting? Here is the photo enhanced with my photo software (see below). I think it looks much different. The real card looks more like the first picture. Unless, of course, you prefer this one...ha ha! I had trouble getting a good photo since it's been so dark and stormy here today. In fact, we had a ton of hail and a tree in our yard almost got hit by lightning! YIKES!!





So, for Expression owners, click HERE to download the cut file.

Baby Bug owners, click HERE to download the cut file.

Coming up this week will be more cards and cut files as well as a summer themed word book with cut file! So, stay tuned and stay cool! Whew! It's hot out there!

New Patriotic Word Book made using Cricut Design Studio

If you've wondered why I haven't posted much this week, I've been working on this!

I wanted to make a chipboard book using Stand & Salute! It is fast becoming one of my favorite cartridges because the images are so FUN! So, I created this book using the Cricut Design Studio software. It is done in the typical "word book" fashion and uses Stand & Salute and George cartridges. You can download the link to the free cut file I made by looking below.

A couple of tips when cutting this may help things go smoothly. First of all, tape down all the edges of your chipboard (see below) before cutting it. I love Star Trek so I put that side up on the mat but it really doesn't matter ;-).



I used Design Studio software "preferences" to set my "multi-cut" to 3 times. I also used cereal box chipboard, taking care to use thinner, rather than thicker chipboard. My blade was on 5, speed on LOW, and pressure maximum. Thanks for Scrapping Grandma from the Cricut board, I knew these were the right settings. I also cut all my papers (adjusting the blade depth, speed and pressure as needed) by reloading the mat and then using double sided-cardstock weight paper from Reminisce. This is their new patriotic line that I picked up at the Great American Scrapbook Convention a few weeks ago.

I used many cuts from the cartridge such as all the book edgings, the firecrackers, the "stars and stripes forever", the USA frame, the America the Beautiful cut with shadow, the tag function, the "Liberty" word art, a circle coaster with USA that I created in Design Studio, also in the cut file, and the hat borders.

Download the cut file HERE!

Enjoy!!

Video on How to Make A Shadow For Your Welded Words in Design Studio

Very clear cut, easy to understand video on how to weld words and then how to make a shadow for those words in the Design Studio program for the Cricut! Five minutes is all it takes to learn this! Woo Hoo!

Happy Easter! Happy Passover! Have a great day, everyone!

Tips on Welding Words Vertically in Design Studio & Making Scalloped Rectangles

Want to make a welded vertical word in Cricut Design Studio? The FAQ Design Studio blog has a written tutorial on how to do this. Click HERE to see how! This blog has some excellent tips on using Design Studio so be sure and check out her other links and info!

Capadia Designs has had some gorgeous things lately (well, really, as always!) on her blog - including St. Patrick's Day frames and bouquets! Today she has a great post about making a scalloped rectangle in the Design Studio so that you get the "right" number of scallops on the rectangle and it isn't all wonky. See HERE for Diane's tutorial!

If you haven't signed up to subscribe to these blogs, you really need to since they have such good info, all the time!

Design Studio Pro - Any more news?

A little background is needed here to talk about the upcoming Design Studio Pro release for the Cricut, which is expected at the Summer Craft and Hobby Association (CHA) convention in July. There has been some information out there about this software on the message boards and the latest rumor is that the software will contain the ability to use the fonts on your computer (.ttf files). This is contrary to the video Glenda shot while at CHA, where she interviewed a rep from the Cricut company (see earlier post HERE).

Now, I recently participated in a focus group for a marketing company looking at new Cricut products (which was very fun!). We were asked to evaluate a new product, which was VERY COOL. At no time during the focus group, which included an employee of Provocraft, was there any mention of an upgrade to the DS software that would include the ability to use .ttf fonts. That does NOT mean that it is not possible, just that there was no mention of it at that time. I have expressed my opinion that PC will not head in that direction, as that is a saturated market (Gazelle, Wishblade, Silohette, Klic 'n Kut, Pazzles, etc.). Who knows if that is correct? But all signs indicate that they do not wish to move in that direction as per Glenda's video.

Grouping Items in the Cricut Design Studio Software

So far, figuring out how to group a set of items to copy, enlarge/reduce, or change as a set has been impossible to figure out. But, Diane at Capadia Designs has put up a tutorial showing how to do this. She makes it look so easy! Thank you Diane! Click HERE to go to her tutorial! Leave her some sweet comments please! This has been impossible to do before now.

Cricut Design Studio Welding

Here's an easy way to weld all the letters of a word together in the Design Studio:

1) With the DS open and your cursor set on the mat where you want it, type the first word (all the letters) with no spaces between them. Then, in the kern box, type "-0.25" (without the quotes) and hit the apply button. This will overlap the letters. If they overlap too much, experiment to see what overlap you like by changing the kern number.

2) Then, highlight each letter and click weld.

Here's a tip: To highlight a letter or object in DS, click on a line segment of the letter or object. This will bring up the bounding box (the one with arrows). I spent many frustrated hours trying to get the letters to highlight.

Also, another tip: If you can't get the cursor to move on the mat, adjust your double click speed. It doesn't seem to handle super fast double clicking well. Slow it up a little bit and see if that helps.

One more thing, the DS program only allows ONE computer to cut your creations. So, if you have DS, you can load it on multiple computers, in order to create things, BUT you may only cut with one of them. I assume it is the FIRST one you load DS onto. I am really cranky about this because a day after I loaded DS onto my Windows laptop, it decided it wouldn't take a charge from the power cord anymore. Arrrgghh!

Cricut Design Studio - How to Make Word Books

Ok, Cricut Design Studio software is on sale at Michaels this week for $60.  And, it is one of the easier ways to create those word books that everyone loves (see photo above).  So, I have been doing some research on exactly how to make those word books and as usual, the internet tells me everything I need to know.  (I love people who are willing to share their knowledge!)

For starters, I found these sites with tutorials on exactly how to make word books.  The end result is a little different amongst the different tutorials, so make sure to look at the photos on the site and see if that is what you want.

Tutorials on Creating Word Books Using Cricut Design Studio:

Susan Blue Robot blog

Jack Russ

A Cherry on Top Tutorial

Now, the blog Everything Cricut and Brandi Gore make a good point of saying, "Hey, as long as you give credit, why not use all the free cut files everyone posts on the internet?  Why reinvent the wheel every time you want to cut something out?"  So, I wondered not only where to find these already designed cut files but also how to download them and get them into the design studio.  Here are some links to help you:

How to download cut files into Cricut Design Studio and Use them - by Brandi Gore

List of sites that have free files

That list of sites with free files is very comprehensive.  It may take me the next week to really look through all those sites.  I'll let you know if I find more goodies.

More Cricut Learning....

The lady mentioned in the previous post also has a site calledLearning the Cricut whereby latest Cricut information is located, with some video and screen shots of how to do different things with Design Studio and the Cricut. Be sure and check it out! VERY informative!

Cricut Design Studio Software HELP

Learning the Cricut Design Studio Software is a website that is offering an e-book for sale, full of step-by-step screenshots of how to use the software and links to over an hour of video tutorials, further explaining the different techniques. Also included is a cheat sheet of sorts, showing shortcuts to create the items you want. This e-book was created by Brandi Gore, who has taught sold-out classes at CK Conventions and her local scrapbooking store (LSS). The people on the yahoo cricutcutter group recommend this book since the manual that comes with the Design Studio does not begin to fully explain all the wonderful things that the Design Studio Software can do for you. The e-book is $37 and has a 60 day money back guarantee. Click HERE to go to the website and read all about it.

I don't usually promote things like this on my blog, since a lot of times much info can be found for free on the internet. BUT, I do know the frustrations of trying to figure out the Cricut in general (hence all the message boards and yahoo groups). I do not receive any monies or such from this post. It is purely informational in nature and may save you a lot of time and frustration.