A BIG VALENTINE FOR YOU!

Cricut turns 5 in 2011! I remember my 5th birthday. Do you remember your fifth year of life? Five-year-olds really know how to party.

There is much promise of increased growth and creativity ahead! Cricut has revolutionized the world of crafting, and so much of the credit goes to you the crafters. Cricut products certainly would not be what they are today without your support. Thank you, thank you for sharing your ideas, time, enthusiasm, friendship, and love of crafting with us.

To express our gratitude, we've planned lots of celebratory fun throughout the year. Think of it as a yearlong party! Many of you may have already noticed the new Cricut logo. Be sure to visit our website often and read the Chirp so you can keep up on all the excitement!

This week, be sure to check out Crafty Kimber's cartridge exploration of the April Showers, Baby Steps, Life's a Party cartridges. As always, I wish you well in your crafting adventures.

FEATURED PROJECTS

MESSAGE BOARD HIGHLIGHTS

This week's highlighted threads are:

• Amore Mini Album
• I'm Nuts a Bolt You 3D Valentine Robot
• Valentine's Welcome Sign
• Valentine Treat Box
• Valentine Gift Boxes

CUSTOMER SPOTLIGHT

Name: Marlene Gomez
About: Hi, my name is Marlene and I love all things crafty: everything from cardmaking to altered art, with an emphasis on scrapbooking. I have a clean and simple style. I love my Cricut Expression and Cricut DesignStudio and use them for almost every project. I love how they give you the freedom and flexibility to combine Cricut cartridges. Together, they have expanded my creativity level.

Marlene's Project: Love Train

YOUR NOTABLE TIP

Today's tip comes from message board member Cyn. Thanks for the clever tip!

Q. "I am new to Cricut. I just got an Expression. How do you know the ratio of height/width for the items you cut before you cut? Or, is it basically just trial and error "

A. "I was doing the trial and error thing for a while but that wastes so much paper. I ended up getting DesignStudio and that shows you exactly how big it will be on the cutting mat. You can download the free trial and use it to check sizes: http://www.cricut.com/cds/Update.aspx."

CARTRIDGE EXPLORATION

This week was pretty busy, but I did manage to make some time to spend with my Cricut. This week I explored April Showers, Baby Steps, Life's a Party cartridges.

April Showers is a new Seasonal cartridge for spring, so if you find a store that is selling them, better pick one up because quantities are limited. Images on this cartridge are: birdcage, bird, squirrel, watering can, house, flower, tree, butterfly, bicycle, and worm. Word art that you can cut includes: "April Showers", "Spring Fever", "Welcome Spring", "Blooming", and "Sunshine". Each of the images has a layer that you can cut to help add some dimension to your image. AprilMorgan from the Cricut message board created this adorable birdhouse card (see pic or click here).

Baby Steps is an absolutely adorable cartridge designed around babies. The artwork in this cartridge makes me wish I had kids, because I could create some adorable projects with these designs. The creative features for this cartridge are: Layer 1, Layer 2, Font, Font Shadow, Phrase, and Phrase Layer. Some images examples are: baby sleeping on a moon, little girl in pajamas and a bib, baby with a toothbrush, little girl in a dress, little girl holding a spoon, baby in a bath tub, girls clothes on a hanger, binky, baby buggy, rattle, bottle, bib, highchair, cupcake, little boy with toothbrush, baby boy crawling, little boy in a bathtub, diapers, tooth, and a clothes line with baby clothes. The baby diapers would make cute little party invitations; use your Gypsy to weld two of them together and you have a card! This cartridge also comes with a Font and Font Shadow. This cartridge also gives you some phrases that make it easy to scrapbook that special moment. Some examples: "Growing so Big", "Baby Steps", "Fun Day Out", "Fresh and Clean", "First Crawl", "All by Myself!", "Spoon", "Bubble Bath", "First Tooth", and "Nap Time".

Life's a Party by 3 Birds is another adorable cartridge for any of your parties, scrapbook pages, or cards. The creative features are: Layer, Phrase, Card, Cupcake Wrapper/Topper, Font, and Font Shadow. If you've ever wanted just one cartridge that could do everything you needed for a party, this is that cartridge. You can create party invitations, party hats, and cupcake wrappers and toppers. You can also cut out numbers and letters to make a banner for the party. Party themes available on this cartridge are: birthday, baby shower, over the hill, princess, wedding, space, baseball, and pirate. Some of the images that you can cut are: wedding ring, present, baby onesie, lion, soccer ball, basketball, treasure chest, alien, castle, guitar, monkey, and princess. You can cut placemats for each of the children to match the party's theme: balloons, castle, rock star with stars and music notes, pirate map, space cadet, and a heart that says "Going to the Chapel". You can also cut out other props: glasses with stars, crown hat, eye-patch, space hat, monkey hat (you could use that basic pattern and add any of the other die cuts if you liked this hat), soccer glasses, "Mother to Be" hat, party box, scepter box, backpack box, treasure box, coffin box, and a baby block favor box. One note I need to mention: in the Phrase feature, you will not only get word phrases but images as well that compliment the words. Each of these images can be set up as a table center piece. Some of the phrases are: "Happy Birthday", "Pretty Princess", "Rock On", "A Pirate's Life for Me", "Blast Off", "Little Monkey", "Over What Hill?", "Wedding Shower", "Rock Star", and "Special Delivery". This cartridge has so much to offer, it's hard to do it justice; this is definitely one of the cartridges that everyone should have in their library. StephaniePoppen from the Cricut message board created an adorable lion baby card using this cartridge (see pic or click here).

That wraps up this exploration. Happy crafting and I wish you tons of luck on finishing your craft projects!

Crafty Kimber

HELP FROM THE EXPERTS

Here's the word from customer support this week:

- To report message board abuse, please email reportabuse@provocraft.com. This is not to use when reporting a post. It is to use when you feel you feel personally abused or offended by content of a message, PM, or e-mail.

- Remember respect of your fellow crafters on the message boards. The message boards are meant to be a fun and creative place. You may review message board rules here.

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Need some help? Provo Craft Customer Support is here for you! Never hesitate to call in (1-888-922-4725 or 1-888-92ccircle for Circle questions); we have people ready to help you! We are currently open Monday through Friday 7am to 6pm Mountain Time. If these hours do not work with your schedule, please send an email to support@provocraft.com.


Have a great week!

From your Customer Support Sweeps:
Mark, Colby, Brittany, and Becky, "The Floor Sweeps"

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

"Friendship is the hardest thing in the world to explain. It's not something you learn in school. But if you haven't learned the meaning of friendship, you really haven’t learned anything."
~ Muhammad Ali