Christmas came early!

[jfugina]

Some of you know this already, because I posted it on FB last night, but I got my Christmas gift from Rob last night. It irritates me a little that he rarely tries to surprise me, but for this, I'll let it go. He got me a Cricut Expression. Wheee! For years I've been saying that I just can't justify the expense. I would have had to pay for it out of my own fun money, and there was always something I wanted more, and I never could quite get enough saved.

Anyway, I come home last night and there's a giant Amazon box in the kitchen. I asked him if Amazon sold pick-up trucks now - I couldn't believe the size of the box. So he tells me that it's fine to open it. He didn't even say it was my gift - otherwise I would have made him take it where I couldn't see it, and wrap it. But I think that the fact it was an electronic gadget, he was too anxious to "inspect" it, rather than wrap it and wait a week.

He played with it for the first 1/2 hour, and cut out lots of little accents and shadows. We still need to make some adjustments to get clean cuts out of my thicker CS cardstock. Unfortunately, there was just too much other stuff to do to spend the whole night playing, and I probably won't even get to spend much time on it over the weekend. But it will definitely be my reward for getting all of my other projects done!

So, now I'm going to start on a whole new collection (after Christmas, of course). What are the "must have" cartridges?

[Monica]

Must-have cartridges kind of depend on your tastes...... Like for me, I have all the Disney ones released (exept Hannah Montana) and keep wishing they'd release more carts in this line since they've barely scratched the surface of the Disney catalog of characters! I'd also love a theme park one, but again.... it's just a wish on my part. I love the Opposites Attract cart because you're getting 2 alphabets on one cart, and they are both cool. Ummm.... let's see.... what else do I recommend? Wild Xard is really cool, and my newest favorite is Winter Woodland, with those cool little houses you can make in 3-D. I recommend that you browse the Cricut website and look at all the carts there... that will give you a good idea of what each one carries.


Monica

[troublesmom]

Congrats on the awesome gift Julie! What fun you will have playing with that in the upcoming year.

[bethrich]

Monica hit all the high points. If you like an elegant font, check out Jasmine. I really like Joys of the Season (that was the one I had two of and sold one to Bonnie). Don't forget to check out the Gypsy to add to your birthday list.

[Hasmom99]

I also like Oppposites Attract. We seem to use Base Camp a lot too - especially for school projects. It is a nice, basic font, but is similar to Plantin Schoolbook. I also have Wild Card, but have found I have not spent enough time exploring it - but it has card templates, shapes and a font. Accent Essential is also really nice. Enjoy your Expression!

[troublesmom]

I don't have many but I do love Jasmine and Base Camp.

[jfugina]

Thanks for the recommendations! I'm told that I can not yet go out and buy any more carts for myself, because I "may still have something to open on xmas still". But that doesn't mean I can't do some browsing and get my wish list started. If he did pick out any additional carts, it will be interesting to see how he did.

I was looking at the site a bit yesterday, and I was wondering about the tags and boxes one. That looked like it could be pretty useful to me. I was also thinking that if there was one for envelopes, that would be very awesome, especially for square envies.

[Hasmom99]

Julie,
The Bags, Tags one is good, although I have completely under-utilized it. Wild Card has envelopes. On the cricut site, there is a forum for each cartridge if you want to view specific samples. www.cricut.com. Also, on the Product portion of the site, they have pictures of what is on each cartridge.

[Lynn K]

hiNT: you can usually get them pretty cheap on ebay, brand new, no shipping. I have "heard" of people buying a cartridge cheaper on ebay and if it isnt the exact cart. they like, go to hobby lobby or wal-mart to exchange it for one they like better and often cost about 3 times more.

[jfugina]

I now have 8 carts, total. Two came in the box with the machine, and then on Christmas, I got the Disney/Pixar Cars cart from Jake, the Tinkerbelle one from Nicole, and the Mickey Font from Rob. Of course, he told me when I got the machine that I wasn't allowed to buy any cartridges myself until after Christmas, but that I could browse and start making wish lists. I promptly declared Wild Card (thanks Lynn!) one of the most useful looking cartridges in existence, and Santa put that one in my stocking.

Then yesterday, I saw an e-mail from Michaels declaring their cartridges for 50% off, which seemed to make them *almost* reasonable. (Rob got all of his from Amazon sellers). I chose Life's a Beach, with the gift card from my mom, and he picked up another cart with Cinderella on it.

I've made exactly one card. Most of this is because I haven't had an opportunity. Rob has been hogging the machine all week. He must have spent 10 hours yesterday making the largest Lightning McQueen and Mac that could come out of 12x12 stock. Those are due to be framed for Jake's room. He also made an Aurora and a Tinkerbell for Nicole's room. We also made smaller Lightning and Tinks, and fed them through the laminating magnet cartridge on my xyron 510, and those are decorating the appliances in the basement kitchen.

Someday I anticipate getting some time on the machine myself. I'll post if I manage to make anything cool. LOL.

[troublesmom]

Julie look forward to seeing what you make.

[pbp908]

Don't laugh, but the one thing that impressed me the most in Oct. when I used someone's machine was the fact that it could cut humongous circles!

[Hasmom99]

Julie,
That is just too funny about your DH! You'll see that when your kids are a little older. the Cricut is great for science fair posters, book report covers and the like.