Cricut Maker

Hello Krafters!!

I know it has been a long time since I posted, but I have been creating! As many of you know, Provocraft has released their newest Cricut called the Maker (they also released the Easy Press and the Bright Pad). What sets this machine apart from the Explore and other machines is the ability to cut fabrics without backing AND using a rotary blade! How cool is that? To add, it will also be able to cut 2.4mm of wood using the knife blade once available. This blade is to be released later this year (originally in Oct but has been pushed back to a later date-sigh). I personally cannot wait until it does…oh the projects I have in mind!

Ok, back to the rotary blade and being able to cut fabric without backing. A few years ago, I made an ornament out of felt that turned out adorable. I remember having to use Stiffey to get the felt stabilized to cut in my machine. With the Maker, you bypass Stiffey and fusing! It cuts felt out beautifully! One thing I noticed is the force to cut is a tad high and it will leave grooves and fabric pieces on you mat. It has been said, for regular fabric, leave the threads on and DO NOT scrape the pink fabric mat. However, with felt, it leaves a lot of fibers. I used a lint roller and it cleaned the mat perfectly. I read others used transfer tape and that was successful as well.

A couple of issues I have with the Maker is replacement rotary blades are not available yet. According to Cricut, the blade will last a long time if we only cut fabric. The second is the knife blade. It was not available at release…which was a little disappointing but not a reason for me not to want it. As I stated earlier, the blade was set to release in Oct. I read the release date has been pushed back due to modifications to the blade. My hope is that it will be available in plenty of time to do Christmas gifts.

Even with those two issues, the Maker is an awesome machine! HSN will have the Maker and a few “goodies” to go along with it on October 3^rd. If you like Anna Griffin (I’m sure she will have exclusive content and fabrics), make sure to tune in.

Below is the first cut:

Placed all of my pieces on the mat according to the color they would be cut. Elmo was cut at approx. 2". Look at how well the eyes cut (FYI, Cricut does not recommend cutting smaller than 3/4" when using the rotary blade) Once all of the pieces were cut, I used fabric glue..which exploded on my project LOL. I was really impressed with the cutting and can see a lot of fun projects in my future..so stay tuned! Krafthead~