QuicKutz Blog: Adventures in Die-Cutting

It's the QuicKutz "Around the World" storm!

Well, if you're a QuicKutz fan you've probably noticed some of the kazillion new Around the World products we've released this week! Here they are in a nutshell:

• 50 United States Shapes on 2x2 dies
• 15 Select Country Shapes on 2x2 dies
• 14 Country Collections on pre-foamed Cookie Cutter dies
• 3 travel-related GooseBumpz embossing dies
• 25 country flag Digital Designs for the Silhouette
• Map and Globe Digital Designs for the Silhouette

Oh, and is that not enough for you? Well, the next Silhouette release (on April 18th) and the standard May release are also going to be related to the Around the World theme. Except that May's release will be anything but standard. I hope I'm not being too much of a tease... I'm just trying to give you as much information as I can.

What? You're not buying it? You think that I'm just saying all that to be a tease? Well, then, I plead the 5th... :)

Okay, back to the new stuff that you already know about. I know that some people are still hesitant about Cookie Cutter dies (perhaps because of a bad foaming experience? boy, that phrase just doesn't sound right!). Well let me tell you that the Country Collections are pre-foamed and NOW IS THE TIME to give Cookie Cutters a chance!

There are so many different types of dies in the Country Collections, and surely at least one (or 8, or 14) have a couple dies that speak to you and you would use a lot on cards or in your scrapbooks.

In case you were wondering, the Norway Collection is my favorite. I was an exchange student there many years ago and I still haven't scrapbooked all of my photos (over 1000 for sure... ) so SOMEDAY I'll be all prepared to do that. And yes, moose crossing signs are really posted all over the country! It's awesome!

Also, did you know that Norwegians not only invented the really cool and utilitarian cheese slicer (ostehøvel), but also the paper clip? During WWII, Norwegians wore a paper clip on their lapel or sleeve to show resistance to the Nazis.

What's your favorite new QuicKutz die or Digital Design and why?

Have a great weekend, everyone!
Yvette

LOVELY new dies released today!

Okay, here's a peek at the new dies that are in stores today! Watch for the full newsletter coming soon to your email inbox (announcing a sale on select Revolution and Cookie Cutter products).

Oh yeah, and happy new year, everyone!

-Yvette

New QuicKutz products today!

Okay, it's Release Day! We have two BRAND NEW product lines for you:

Silhouette Digital Design Portfolio CDs

Adhesive Vinyl + Transfer Paper

Some of you have already commented on the last post with concerns about not having downloadable digital designs. Don't worry!  We'll still be releasing new downloadable designs every month in addition to these new software CDs. In fact, we're releasing more on Friday. ;) It's definitely a month for Silhouette users to rejoice!

Now about the vinyl... can I just say that this is some of the coolest stuff since sliced bread? Now, I love me some bread, but some of the things that I've seen made with new Adhesive Vinyl (and the prototypes we tested out) are just awesome. Quotes on walls are big, plus custom vinyl designs for your car (bumper stickers might go out of style) and OMG, just look for yourself in our idea gallery. Amy, our in-house designer, amazes me almost every single day with what she creates.

By the way, Adhesive Vinyl works great in your Squeeze and Revolution, too! Of course you can't cut out HUGE letters like you can with the Silhouette, but you can do some cool stuff nonetheless. I haven't tried it yet myself, but if you typeset some Cookie Cutter letters on the Revolution platform and run some vinyl through there... you could theoretically then use the transfer paper to transfer that word directly to your wall or project. Hmm... off to borrow some space in Amy's crop room...

If you have questions about these products, feel free to ask in the comments area or contact customer service (customerservice@quicktuz.com). And as always, thanks for reading!

-Yvette

 

Best way to foam Cookie Cutter Dies

It's somewhat quiet in the office because a lot of people are at MemoryTrends. This is very weird for the Marketing department because we're usually quite noisy!

And while it's quiet, the constant work is still flowing. Job security, right? But while we sometimes have a small "break" between trade shows, today Barbara (our project manager) came over to my desk with work to done for CHA. That's in February! I kind of feel like I'm cheating on MemoryTrends a little, since it's still going on...

But before I get ahead of myself, let me take a break to the present and share some foaming tips with you. I've heard through the customer service grapevine that the foaming process shown in the Cookie Cutter instruction guide (using the Sticky Mat Set) is a little complicated. So here's an easier way that should also help your foam to stay stuck in those dies!

1. Peel away the paper backing from a sheet of 4x4 ejection foam to expose the adhesive.
2. Place as many dies as possible on the adhesive surface of the foam, design side down. Make sure dies do not overlap. Allow more space around smaller dies (like punctuation and SkinniMini alphabets for best results.
3. Place dies and foam, sticky side down, on the platform of the Revolution (make sure it's entirely within the indentation on the platform).
4. Place a 4-inch wide piece of cardstock over the ejection foam. (This is the step that will really help that foam stay inside your dies!)
5. Cover with the standard Revolution cutting mat (not the thinner one from the Sticky Mat Set)
6. Spin handle to roll platform through Revolution tool. Stop when pressure eases. You'll hear some "crunching" and that's normal.
7. Remove the cutting mat, cardstock and foamed dies. Gently peel away excess foam from the platform. Imprints on your cutting mat are normal.

Look at the "Apply Ejection Foam (Option 2)" graphic on our website to get a visual on how the layers come together.

If you need more foam, you can buy a 20-pack of 4x4 ejection foam from your local or online retailer for $6.99 (or cheaper if it's on sale).

Hope this helps... let me know if you have any other questions. Or you can always call the friendly chums in customer service (888-702-1146).

-Yvette

Huge Release at MemoryTrends!

Just in case you didn't get today's newsletter, check out all of the cool Holiday shapes and Cookie Cutter dies that were released at the MemoryTrends industry trade show in Las Vegas! Jake and I are "stuck at home" while most people in the office are at the show. Oh well, at least that gets us out of having to help set up and clean up! In the meantime, here are some preview photos:

There's a mix of 2x2 and 4x4 QuicKutz shapes for these upcoming holidays: Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.

Do you like that paper doll? It's on one 4x4 die!  There are three different costume themes to go with it... Pilgrims, Native Americans and Nativity clothes.

I showed the printout of these shapes to my husband last night (yes, he got a sneak peek... lucky duck!) and asked him which ones he liked best since he loves this time of year with all of its holidays.

This, of course, means that I know which ones would be best to bring home first! I thought his choices were interesting: the bat and spider, the spider web, leaves, snowflakes and Christmas tree. His reaction to the Revolution shapes in general?

"Wow!  Those shapes are really big!"

Tee hee... silly boy!  The big shapes are one of the coolest things about using the Revolution!

Here are the other new products on Cookie Cutter Dies, including two Grand-size alphabets:

Oh yes, I'm loving these alphabets and shapes!  Especially the monograms! Of course the first monograms that I'll be bringing home are the three different styles of the letter Y.

I hope that you liked this release as much as I did. I know that it's a lot all at once! But then again, the holidays are right around the corner...  so whatever QK shapes and alphabets you take home now or put on your wish list, go forth and Scrapbook!

-Yvette

Cookie Cutter Challenge

The official Cookie Cutter Challenge contest has ended (well, it ended on August 31st, now didn't it?) and while I don't have the winner to announce yet, I do want to congratulate the thousands of you who succeeded in what may have been the most ridiculous challenge ever created.  If you have absolutely no idea what I'm talking about, please refer to the Cookie Cutter Challenge at the following internet address: http://www.quickutz.com/public/games/ccc.

Clearly the best part of this game is the chicken.  Maybe it's the cute little beak that makes me chuckle or maybe it's just Yvette's voice going "bak-awk" over and over again.  Either way, the chicken is clearly the star of this game and so I've decided to give you that chicken in .gsd format for the cutting on your Silhouette machine.  Download the file now, save to your computer somewhere and open it with the Silhouette software.  You'll find all the pieces you need to make the chicken are broken up so you can cut them out of different colors of paper.  Just select the shape, right click and then choose "Ungroup" to separate the pieces in order to drag them where you want them.  Here's what you'll get if you're diligent (and mind you, I'm no scrapbooker):

Here's the Cookie Cutter Challenge chicken (I give myself 2 points for alliteration) .GSD file: ccc-chicken.gsd

So cut away and let me know if you make something super awesome with the cookie cutter challenge chicken of glory.  Don't forget to pass this shape along to your friends.  It's free to use and share, but just remember where you got it and please link to this blog instead of straight to the file.

jake

The Cookie Cutter Kitten

I have a little story for all of you early birds who found this blog before it's officially announced at CHA! Yes, at that point we should be updating more regularly.

Before I tell you, though, I'll give you a quick overview of what to expect on this blog. There will be different QK employees writing at different times, and you can tell who's writing by checking the very bottom of the post.  Also, to read posts by certain people or about certain subjects, you can filter the entries by clicking on one of the "categories" links to the left of this entry. There aren't many choices now... but there will be!

Now to the story of the Cookie Cutter Kitten...

Jake and I were working fast and furiously last Tuesday to update the website and send out the newsletter to announce Cookie Cutter Dies to our anxiously awaiting fan base (you!).

Melanie had run over to the Shipping/Die Plant area for a bit, and when she came back around 10am, she announced that she heard a kitten mewing outside the front doors of our office!

A few of us went outside to look, and sure enough... there was this little cutie, all scared and a little dirty and obviously hungry. We managed to coerce her into our arms with some string cheese, then fed her a little chicken from someone's lunch and gave her some water.

Isn't she adorable?!? I would have made the decision to take her home immediately if my husband and I didn't already have two 7-year-old cats. There were some murmurs about calling the pound, so to prevent that I asked our HR manager to send out an email to the whole company, letting everyone know about her. No takers.... and I decided that if nobody else would take her home, I'd rather take her than drop her off at the Humane Society.

I would have gladly held her on my lap all day, but that was impossible with the Cookie Cutter release less than two hours away. So she was passed around the office and people took turns holding her until the release was done and I had a chance to breathe. I didn't want to take her home without knowing that she was worm and disease-free, so luckily I found a vet that was willing to examine her and hold her until the end of the work day.

My husband stopped by to meet her and talk about the situation before I took her to the vet. We have the space in our home and our hearts, but the main concern was if the other two cats were still young enough to accept another feline family member. By the end of the day, there were still no takers for this little Cookie Cutter Release Day Kitten, and I was trying very hard not to fall in love with her. I gave up as soon as I put her in her new little carrier (a step up from the QuicKutz shipping box) and she fell asleep in the car.

Well, now it's been a week since she's lived with us, and she's quite the adorable little rascal. We played with a lot of Cookie Cutter-related names, but didn't find any that really suited her. We settled on "Phoebe."  She loves to snuggle up under my chin whenever possible!

As for our other cats, Isis (originally a stray herself) is still hissing at Phoebe when she gets too close, but follows her around the house and watches her every move. I think more friendly interactions are not too far away.

Loki, as you can see from the photo below, has already accepted her into the family with his "whatever" attitude. I think he's mostly perplexed by her energy!

See that dumb phrase on the photo? It's actually my first attempt at the dumb, funny, highly addictive "lolcats" meme. Look it up, if you dare!

Brian (Customer Service Manager/Silhouette Guru) and I love them, which causes some of our coworkers think that we're, um, special....

Okay, and now that I've told you the cat story, I'll try not to gush over my feline friends too much here on the QuicKutz blog. But clearly, this story involves the new Cookie Cutter product line, so I thought you'd like to hear about it.

I hope that you've at least had a chance to try out the Cookie Cutter dies at your local store... they're really cool, and I'm amazed at some of the things that can be created with them.  I don't know if Typepad will allow you to upload a photo in the comments section under this blog, but if you can, we'd love to see what you've created with your new Cookie Cutter dies!

Until next time,
Yvette

Cookie Cutters

Cookie Cutters.  "What are they", you ask?  "Well, I'll tell you," I answer.  They're a new breed of QuicKutz dies specially made to raise the general awesomeness and/or cuteness of your projects.  These new dies are to be used with our Revolution tool to create hundreds of new possibilities.  Instead of square dies, the new Cookie Cutter dies are trimmed around the edges of the cutting shape allowing you to fit more dies on your Revolution for faster crafting.  You'll save more paper, speed up your projects, and bring a whole new dimension to your crafting.  To really understand what I'm talking about you'll have to check out our web site and see for yourself.

http://www.quickutz.com/cookiecutter

Also, as part of the amazing new Cookie Cutter dies and whatnot, we've created a little challenge for you to take.  It's creatively called the QuicKutz Cookie Cutter Challenge (that's alliteration, kids).  It's a new game on our website guaranteed to provide you with at least 2 minutes of fun-filled enjoyment and/or bliss.  In the game you'll have to bake cookies faster than you ever have before as you race the clock to become the ultimate baker.  Ironically, the game will not actually improve your real ability to bake, cook, broil or even toast, however (like I said), you just might be entertained for a couple of minutes.  Go on and try it out.  I know you're dying to.

http://www.quickutz.com/public/games/ccc

jake