How to Perfectly Place Cricut Cutouts on your page

I have been using a technique for several years to perfectly place my Cricut cutouts on to my scrapbook pages.  The other day a friend of mine asked me how I put them on the page so perfectly, so I decided that I needed to share my very easy technique.  There is also a video at the bottom of this page showing the technique. 

You may want to click on the pictures to enlarge them so that you can see the fine detail.

Step 1: Use your Cricut Machine to cut out your design. If you click on the picture you will be able to enlarge it and see the faint cut lines on the right hand page.  It is important to use your Cricut Design tool to place the cut image exactly where you will want to place it on the final page.

Step 2: Remove the “left over” paper carefully. Take the “left over” paper and use tape to carefully line it up exactly where you want it to go on your background paper.  Do you stick the tape to background paper as this may damage it.   You can see the importance of centering your design in step 1.  This then creates a template for the cutout to be placed in.

Step 3: Carefully remove the image cuts, and use adhesive tabs on the back of the large cutouts.  Carefully place the cutout into the template, making sure that it is perfectly aligned within the template.  This is important for later steps when we remove the template.

Step 4:  Place smaller cutouts using a glue pen to put glue on the inside of the template directly onto the background page. Then take the cutout off of the cutting mat and place into the template on top of the glue.  Press down firmly for about 1 second.  I use the Cricut Accessory Tools to help place the very small cutouts.

Continue placing all of the elements of the cut into the template using either adhesive tabs or glue until all the cut outs are placed.  Press down firmly on the entire piece making sure that all of the cutouts are aligned and properly affixed, and that the glue is dried.

Step 5: Carefully remove the “Left Over” template page. You will have to do this just as carefully as when you originally removed it from the mat making sure that you don’t pull any cutout pieces with it.  After removing the template press down on all of the remaining cutouts to make sure that they are properly affixed.

Cricut Maker: This is the newest model of the Cricut machine, and in addition to cutting paper and cardboard, it also has settings and blades to cut fabric and balsa boards. This allows the tool to be used with a much larger range of craft projects beyond paper crafts. So, if you quilt, sew or make light wooden crafts in addition to scrapbooking, then this will be the perfect tool for you. It comes with Bluetooth wireless technology to allow you to control your machine from your table or phone. Since it is the newest model it is the priciest (list price $399), but can sometimes be found at a discount at various stores.