This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Cricut. The opinions and text are all mine.
Have you been considering whether or not to invest in a Cricut Maker? Maybe it’s on your holiday wish list this season, but you’re trying to sell your significant other or spouse on why you need a Cricut Maker in addition to all your other crafting supplies?! Today I thought I’d share with you 5 Things I Love about my Cricut Maker and why you need one in your household whether your a craft goddess or a newbie. The Cricut Maker is made for all levels of experience and for all different uses and reasons. So I’ll first tell you about why I love my Cricut Maker and then show you an easy project on How to Cut Leather on the Cricut Maker (which is just ONE of the many cool things that the Cricut Maker can cut for you!).
5 Reasons I Love My Cricut Maker
Reason #1
The Cricut Maker is amazing first and foremost because it can do so much and it does it well. I’ve used other cutting machines before and I struggle with using them and I find there to be a HUGE learning curve. Cricut’s Design Space is intuitive, they have pre-made projects for newbies and options to create your own projects for more advanced users. They also have tons of tutorials and Q&A for how to use their products. Also, they work with bloggers like me to give tutorials so that it’s easier to use their products. My go to blog for Cricut Tutorials is Hey, Let’s Make Stuff. I go there and Cori helps me get where I need to use my Cricut the way I want. I also love that the Cricut Maker does a great job cutting my projects. All too often, on my last “other brand” cutting machine, I’d spend hours designing my project and then I just couldn’t get the machine to cut it nicely enough to make it a nice project. I was SO disappointing! The Cricut Maker does an amazing job with cutting.
Reason #2
The Cricut Maker can cut so many different things!!! This isn’t just a machine for cutting cardstock and vinyl…it can cut leather, fabric, felt, basswood, and so many other things like engraving aluminum sheets, cutting infusible ink, addressing envelopes with Cricut pens, and so much more!! Basically, Cricut has taken the standard cutting machine capabilities and turned this into a crafting machine. You can do SO much with the Cricut!
Reason #3
This is kind of a silly reason, but with all the supplies you have for a Cricut, I love that Cricut planned a place for us to store them! They have a little tool storage place on top of the Cricut Maker where you can keep all your tools. It’s the little things like this that really make a difference for me!
Reason #4
One more reason to love the Cricut…goes back to all the options. They have a blade for everything and their instructions make it easy to know which blade you need for each thing that you’re cutting. I love all the options for different cuts including fabric blades, scoring wheels, deep knife cuts, engraving and more!!
Reason #5
I also love that Cricut has the option for using pens. You can use the Cricut pens to address envelopes, create cute printables and invitations and so much more! Remember…this all goes back to what I’ve been saying about how it’s not just a cutting machine!
There’s SO much you can do with a Cricut Maker and one of the things I was most excited to try out when I got my Cricut was to try cutting leather with it. So today I thought I’d show you how we made this cute Teacher Gift Idea and how to cut leather using your Cricut Maker. It’s very easy and there are so many cool things you can make with leather!
How to Cut Leather with a Cricut Maker
For this project you will need:
Cricut Strong Grip Mat
Metallic Leather.
Deep Cut Blade
Tassel or decoration
How to make a Teacher Gift Bookmark using the Cricut Maker:
I started by designing this in Cricut Design Space. You can go to my exact design here and modify it to fit your project best. I typed in our teacher’s name and then hit Cut to get to this page. It sets it up on two different pages, so I combine the cut onto one mat and then I decided to mirror it. After working with leather in the past, I have found that placing the metallic leather face down on the strong grip mat works best, which is why you have to be sure that Mirror is on!
Once I’m ready to cut, I get started and the machine does the rest. Again, using Metallic Leather means that you have to use the Cricut Deep Cut blade otherwise it will not cut all the way through.
Note that when cutting leather the blade goes over it several times and it does take much longer to cut. So just be patient.
Once it was done, I pulled off the leather from the mat and I added a cute tassel and admired out work. I love how it turned out and it’s an easy and unique personalized teacher gift idea!
You can pair it with your favorite book and give it to a teacher or friend for the holidays!
Look at those crisp cuts!!
I hope you guys feel confident in your decision now to commit to the Cricut Maker. It’s been my favorite crafting tool by far in all of my years crafting…and that says a lot.
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