Using the Silhouette Mint for the First Time to make a Journaling Stamp

Hello, hello, Karen here with a little project I made using a Silhouette Mint.  All of the Design Team are taking turns to have the Mint for a month and this month it is my turn.

When I received this little machine I was a bit unsure if I would like it as I am definitely not a stamper in fact I would describe myself as stamp phobic.  It always, always goes wrong and I stamp where I don't want to stamp, smudge my stamps or just make a mess of it.  I am certainly not a confident stamper.

What you will need:-
Silhouette Mint

Step One - Designing Your Stamp.

• Yes that is all you will need as I am going to use the colours and stamp kit that come with the machine.  You need to download the software from here.  Once you attach your Mint to your computer the free designs will automatically be downloaded into your library. 
• Open your Mint Studio software and choose a 45 x 45 stamp 

• From the options on the left of your screen choose the fourth one down, and from this one choose the shape that is a square with a zig-zag edge.

• Drag a square onto your stamp area and under the scale menu (third from left on the top right options) and resize the shape to 1.7ins x 1.7ins.

• You can alter the size of the 'zig-zags' by pulling the 'zipper' shape.

• Under the OBJECT menu choose ALIGN and then ALIGN CENTRE-MIDDLE and this will centre the square to the centre of your stamp. 

• Next from your library choose the Floral Sprig and drag it to the bottom left corner. Resize it to .6in wide and .75in high.

• Under the EDIT menu COPY the Floral Sprig and under the same menu choose PASTE.

• Then under the OBJECT menu choose ROTATE 180 and drag into the top right corner.

• Use the DRAW A LINE tool (fourth down from the left side menu) to draw a line. Change it to a dotted line and change the line thickness to 1.

• Copy the line and paste it 4 times - this will give you evenly spaced lines.  Then select all the lines and move them closer to the bottom of the page. 

• Move your lines until you are happy where they are placed on your stamp. 

• The final step in preparing your stamp is to add your text to the top. 

STEP 2 - Making Your Stamp

• To make your stamp all you have to do is connect the Mint to your computer and click the leaf icon.  The programme will tell you exactly what to do and your stamp will be printing in no time.

• Once printed add to the plastic block and use the inks to colour the lines.  I used several colours for mine but accidentally ' blobed' too much in one corner which resulted in a patch of blue on my purple. 

• After waiting for the ink to soak in I stamped a few times onto a scrap of paper to clean the stamp and then was able to use my journal stamp on the layout I had planned. 

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