What Is Your Favorite Scrapbooking Tool?
Wednesday, March 25th, 2009
Hi everyone, so I have a question for you all. What is the one simple thing you just can’t live without in your scrapbooking baby tools collection? Okay so keep it simple and don’t go saying your Cricut or Sizzix machines, lol. Think back to the basics and the important stuff you needed early on in your scrapbooking hobby.
Now for me there are actually two things that I still to this day just can’t live without and if anyone runs away with them in my house I get most upset about. They are both made by Fiskars, any ideas yet?
Yes my scissors and my paper trimmer. I think I may have actually nearly worn my paper trimmer out but it is still going strong for now and the scissors are still fantastic. How many mats do you cut, how many photos do you trim or crop, and getting the perfectly square edge each time and having things line up properly. Nothing makes this more simple and easy than a good paper trimmer. Now just because mine is Fiskars, does not mean that you need to choose this brand, I brought mine a long, long time ago, and the choices back then, were a little limiting to say the least.
However, would I buy another Fiskars trimmer when this one finally wears out, yes without any hesitation, the replacement blades are quite cheap and so easy to replace.
Now as for my scissors, I was looking for a good pair for a friend of mine just the other day and I would still have to say the best ones I found were indeed Fiskars. Now you might be starting to think I have some secret deal with them, well no I don’t, but I am not afraid to tell you how it is, and if I didn’t like them, I would be telling you. I like a product that works for me, the way I want it to work and as smoothly and simply as possible, I have enough complicating things in my life without having the read the manual on a new scrapbooking tool ten times before I can use it.
So what is it I like about the Fiskars scissors? Well first of all it’s not just any ol’ pair of Fiskars scissors, but the spring loaded ones that I love. I cannot tell you how tired your hands get from constantly manually opening and closing scissors when you are trimming something fine, like a photo or some lettering. You may be using those scissors for an hour sometimes, and boy do your hands start to cramp and hurt, and then sometime you snip too far and ruin what you have spent so much time on.
Well this does not happen when you use the little spring loaded scissors. The spring holds the scissors open, so be careful to have the safety latch engaged when they are not in use, as these scissors are so sharp they could cause a nasty injury. So by the spring holding the scissors open, the only effort needed is the action of closing or squeezing them, and then they push back open again, so it’s half the effort and as a result I really do feel you get more control over what you are working on.
So personally for me when it come to scrapbooking tools these are the two things I just can’t live without, and are probably the first tools I invested in and I must say I am still very happy with them to this day. One final tip when it comes to trimming delicate items like photos and letters with your scissors is never move the hand that is holding the scissors. Do not maneuver the scissors around the edge of the object, but instead turn the object around the scissors. By this I mean, hold the scissors still and if you are cutting around an “o” turn keep turning the “o” but hold the scissors totally still, try it, you will be amazed how much neater the results will be.
Until next time… happy scrappin



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