Tropical Bliss for Miss Kate Cuttables -- Plus a Product Review

Hello everyone! I have a new project up today at Miss Kate Cuttables -- it's a fun, beachy, girly layout, and I just love it. Here's a sneak peek:

In addition to sharing the project itself, I wanted to do a little product review. About a month ago, I was sent a package of glue products from Beacon Adhesives. It was a great assortment for all kinds of crafting projects:

So fun! For my layout today, I used the Zip Dry Paper Glue and the 3-in-1 Advanced Craft Glue to see how they would work with the delicate cut files from Miss Kate Cuttables.

In a word -- perfect! The Zip Dry Paper Glue is a clear liquid that applies easily and lets you move and line up your layers. It does dry quickly, but not so quick that you can't make adjustments if you need to. It does tend to dry out in the bottle tip, so I kept a stick pin stuck in the top as I was working to keep it clear. And since it's a liquid glue, it works great for the very small, delicate pieces you can cut with your electronic die cutter.

I used the 3-in-1 Advanced Craft Glue to adhere the Royal Jewels on all of my flowers. Again, it worked perfectly. It was very easy to make a precise little glue dot and then layer on the Jewels. After drying, the Jewels are still stuck on very well.

Thank you to Beacon Adhesives for letting me try out their wonderful line of glue products. I can't wait to create more fun with their adhesives soon.

And now, you'll have to head over to the Miss Kate Cuttables blog to see my layout. Let me know what you think!

Until next time -- stay crafty,
Lissa :)

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Product Review: Xyron Creatopia Shapez

I've become a bit of a die-cutting fiend lately. I love cutting my own letters, borders, and journaling shapes out of any paper I choose. I currently have a Big Shot die cutting machine and a Quickutz Revolution. Both machines are great. But it was a bit of a pain to have 2 machines, storage- and space-wise. Plus I like to add adhesive to my paper before cutting it, so I had a third large machine in play - the Xyron Creatopia. I LOVE my Creatopia for putting an even layer of adhesive on my die cut projects. But having to get out all three machines while I was scrapping made me not want to get any of them out.

So one day I was browsing around the web and discovered that I could get a die cut machine that fits inside my Creatopia - the Creatopia Shapez. And I realized that all my prayers were answered. (Okay, I can get a little overly excited about little things.) And we had a garage sale coming up, so if I could sell my Revolution and my Big Shot, I'd have a single machine to do all my die cutting and adhesive-ing (a word I made up). That got me really excited.

I ordered the Shapez set from Create For Less (it's out of stock right now, but you can still get it from Xyron.com). I had to try it out as soon as it arrived.

The process of taking the adhesive cartridge and rolling wheel out of the Creatopia is easy once you get the hang of it. And the die press fits right inside the Creatopia - the platform then folds down to make a nice surface to roll the plates through. Cutting-wise, it works just great, the same as the Big Shot but a bit wider at 6.5" instead of just 6".

You can cut with every kind of die - thick or thin. You can emboss too (in fact, an embossing mat is included, which I had to buy separately for the Big Shot). I was even able to cut with a long Sizzix border die and the long border cutting plate I had for the Big Shot. I had to shim it up a bit to get it thick enough to go through the Shapez cutter, but it worked just great too.

If you want to learn how to really use your die cutting machines, you need to take the A Cut Above class from Online Card Classes.

I know it says it's a card-making class but it's so much more than that. The class covers traditional die-cutting machines and Silhouette/Cameo die-cutting. There are so many moments of "Oh - so that's how you do that..." I can't even begin to tell you how much I learned from this class. It definitely gave me the confidence to get out my die-cutting machines - traditional and electronic - with every layout I've been creating.

Cork letters cut with the Quickutz 4x8 Chocolate alpha die

Overall, I am so very happy with the Shapez die cutting machine. It does everything I did with my Big Shot machine but integrates with my Creatopia so that I have just a single machine to do everything. If you already have a Creatopia and you like to die cut, the Shapez machine is a great solution. If you don't have a Creatopia, you should get one. I'm just sayin'...

On a related note, I was able to sell my Big Shot and my Revolution in my garage sale - so I was able to pay for the Shapez as a break-even deal. Which was a big deal to me since I'm trying to keep to a budget for my scrapping habits. Yay me!