Snowflake becomes a Lattice

While I was working on the snowflakes in my last post I became fascinated by the possibilities I saw in one particular snowflake. When welded together in multiples a very interesting lattice pattern emerges. I decided to try this in several sizes to see what effects I could achieve.

In order to get the all over pattern I needed to add elements that went off the mat - this is the first time I have attempted this. It opens up more options but leaves the chore of tedious hand trimming to get your final cut (the trimming isn't too bad, however, I would love it if an upgrade to the software included an "erase" option and the ability to close lines on the design when a portion is erased. I tried this idea in three different sizes - 3, 4 and 5 inch snowflakes.

Here are the screen shots showing how the design was built:

Five inch



Four inch



Three inch



When the element goes off the mat you sometimes have to rotate it (using the "turn" button in the Shape Properties box) to get the positioning handle in an area where you can control the movement of the element. This is another area where an improvement to the software could be made - it would be nice to be able to click and drag on any part of the selected element to position it.

When these designs are cut you will need to do some trimming after they are taken off the mat. Here is the corner of the five inch cut before trimming



This is how it looks after the corner lines are extended by your scissors and the extra material removed



Here is a corner of the four inch lattice before trimming - the small purple square is 3/4 inch to give you the scale.



At first I thought I could freehand cut the completion of the circular ends of the sn0wflake



but that turned out to be too difficult and sloppy looking so I changed the trimming pattern to eliminate those areas. Here is the partially trimmed design



And here is the final version



Finally, here is the untrimmed three inch lattice



and here it is after trimming



Here are the three sizes against a bright green background which dramatically changes the look







Below is the small blue snowflake from my last post on top of the five inch lattice to show the difference in scale and the amazing ability we have to cut intricate or large designs with the Cricut!



Finally, I have for you a gallery of "layouts" (actually, just elements and photos placed together in different combinations) to give you some ideas of the possibilities for highlighting special photos in your albums or in a frame. I hope you like these and can find a way to use them for your favorite photos.


































Three inch JOTS Lattice

Four inch JOTS Lattice

Five inch JOTS Lattice