It was the flattened spoons that started it all. Then I tried cake and pie servers, a cookie spatula, and now there is this tutorial on how to engrave stainless steel spreaders with your Cricut engraving tool. I knew I wanted to try to engrave spreaders with a Cricut but wasn’t sure if I should do butter spreaders, jam spreaders, or cheese spreaders. In the end, it was the cheese spreaders that won just because it was so. much. fun. coming up with the cheesy phrases to engrave on them (brie mine tonight, you spin me like a Roquefort baby, once in a bleu cheese.) I admit a few of the puns are a bit of a stretch but that’s part of the cheesy fun!
I did find that spreaders are a little different than servers or spatulas. The surface area is so much smaller and linear than it is on the servers or spatulas. Any designs you create have to fit perfectly. So to add my cheesy sayings to the cheese spreaders took more design tweaks then past projects have. But never fear! I figured it all out and have both a video demoing it all and a tutorial with a supplies list that steps it out for you below!
How to Engrave Cheesy Cheese Spreaders with Your Cricut Engraving Tool
Supplies and Materials
- Cheesy Cheese Sayings .png file from my Creative Resource Library
- Stainless Steel Spreaders
- Cricut Maker
- Purple Strong Grip Mat (Cricut)
- Cricut Engraving Tip (tip with Quick Swap Housing)
- Painter’s Tape or Masking Tape
- Ruler
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Directions
Step One: Get the free Download for Cheesy Cheese Sayings
I have TWO free oh-so-cheesy designs free in my Creative Resource Library. I actually did eight (I was on a roll) but I chose two that I really liked and thought we could use those to start with. So I have a “Brie Mine Tonight” and a “Swiss Me Baby One More Time” that I think would be great as a wedding, valentine, or shower present.
Step Two: Upload the PNG file to Cricut Design Space
When you upload this PNG file, you’ll be prompted to process it as an Image Upload. Choose Medium.
It will give you the option to clean up the file. I usually just click once on the checkered background and then move on. When prompted, click on the “Save as a Cut” image and then continue. This takes you back to your Uploaded Images page, where you can select the file and click “Insert Image” to send it to your canvas.
Step Three: Separate the Designs
This is kind of a neat trick to know. Rather than give you two separate designs, I created a .png with both. But we want to be able to separate them for the cut. To do this, you click on the Shapes option on the left side toolbar on your canvas. Then, choose the square. Unlock the shape by clicking on the little lock symbol in the lower-left corner. Then use the handle in the lower right corner of the selection to size the square to fit over just one of your designs. Select both this square and the designs and then use the slice tool on the lower right-hand side of your desktop screen. This will cut out of the square of your image. Delete the square, delete the copy of the image, and you’ll have your original images- now free to move independently of the other.
Tip: This quick trick works great with SVG files that you’d like to separate but can’t ungroup.
Step Four: Duplicate, Align and Attach the Design
Next, to get a deeper engraving, use the “Duplicate” button in the layers panel and duplicate the design 2-3 times. Select all, and from the drop-down options under “Align” in the edit panel, choose “Center.” The images will now stack perfectly. Next, click on the “Attach” button at the lower right side of the screen.
Repeat with the second design.
Step Five: Change the Linetype to Engrave, Size the Design, and Rotate it
Change the Linetype from “Cut” to “Engrave” on both designs.
The spreader we’re using has an engravable surface that is about .7″ x 2.25.” Because of the room that the roller needs, Cricut automatically limits us from placing a design any closer to the edge of the grid than 11.75″. You are also working with the curve in the handle. That needs to be placed about .5″ from the bottom of the grid on your mat. So those are the three restrictions you have when you decide on the size of your image. I’ve already taken those things into account when I created my designs.
The designs fit best (again, with the spreaders that I’m using) if we change each individual design’s width to 1.4″. When we do this, the height of the design will change automatically to stay in proportion- to about .5″. But if you’re not using the same spreaders, then you’ll want to measure the surface and make a note of any curve to the blade that you’ll have to fit the design around. One last thing to do before we are ready to go is to rotate the design upside down. The top toolbar has a rotate feature that is perfect for this. Just type in 90, and the design turns perfectly into position.
{Sometimes- I’m not sure why, but when the design is transferred to the mat on the next screen, it doesn’t appear rotated. To fix this, you’ll have to do it manually on this screen by taking the little handle in the upper right corner of the selection box and turn it yourself.}
Whoo-hoo! Go ahead and click on the “Make it” button in the upper right corner of your canvas!
Step Six: Move the Design to the Center and Bottom Edge of the Screen
On the next screen, you’ll see an image of the mat with your design on it. Drag your design to the very bottom of this mat image, and then rotate it if necessary. I found it works best to position the side of your design directly flat against one of the vertical inch lines on your mat’s grid. Then when you place your spreader on the mat, you’ll know to position it so that it is slightly to the right of that same line. It just gives you a lot more precise idea of where the Cricut will cut your image.
Step Seven: Position and Tape the Spreader to the Edge of your Mat Upside Down
This is the part where we talk about the handle. It’s kind of what made engraving on servers, spatulas, or spreaders seem impossible. Because the typical handle is too big and/or curved to go through the Maker. The handle will jam the rollers, but the flat metal part of a server or spatula can go through. The cool thing is that the Cricut machine doesn’t feed the entire mat through the rollers.
So if we position our object so that the handle hangs off the bottom edge of the mat, then only the flat part we want to engrave on actually goes through the machine!
What this means is that when you position your spreader you’ll want to place the spreader so that the part that goes up on the handle is what you want to keep away from the roller. Usually, this means positioning this part of the handle .5″ away from the bottom of the grid.
And again, with this project, you’ll want to place your spreader’s right edge slightly to the right of the line that your image is aligned to.
Tip: I often use the metric side of a ruler to double-check the exact positioning of my spreader using the metric numbers at the bottom of the mat to guide me.
Step Eight: Tape your Spreader to the Mat
Once you have your spreaders positioned, press down on its entire surface to get a strong adhesion to the mat. Then, use some painter’s tape and tape just along the edges. You don’t want to engrave through the tape as this will gum up the engraver. BUT, you do want to make sure that it is securely taped down. So if you need to lay some extra tape across the top and bottom and along the sides, then you should. You can see in the photo below how I did it. And I think after I took the photo I maybe added a little more tape on either side of the handle.
Finally, select the “Continue” button on the lower-right corner of the screen. Almost done now!!!
Step Nine: Prepare to Engrave your Spreader
Turn on your machine and move the star wheels all the way to the right side of the roller. Then, press the load button to load your mat into the Maker. Next, following the prompts on the screen, choose “Stainless Steel” as your material setting. Make sure you’ve inserted your engraving tip.
Step Ten: Engrave your Cheese Spreader with Cheesy Sayings!
On the screen, Cricut will tell you that you can go ahead and press the flashing go button on your Cricut Maker. This will start the engraving. First, the machine will double-check it has the right blade. Then it will begin to engrave your spreader. Because it’s going over the design 3 times, it will take a little longer than you may be used to.
Now watch it engrave! Once it’s finished, you can unload your mat and then peel off the tape. IF at any time something starts to go wrong, you can pause the engraving or even cancel the engraving.
Step Eleven: Remove the Spreaders and Clean them Up
A quick tip as you finish is that when peeling off the tape, use the adhesive side of the tape to press on the engraving. This will remove any surface metal shavings. Do Not use your hand to swipe across the surface as you could end up with embedded bits of metal in your hand. Ouch!
Then, use a cloth (or a stainless steel cloth if you have it) to clean up your spreader and remove any tape residue or fingerprints. Store the spreaders so that their blades won’t knock against each other and scratch the engraved surface. This is especially important if you plan to sell your product!
And Done! You’ve Learned How to Engrave Spreaders with a Cricut!
Yay! If this was your first time engraving or your tenth time- congratulations on trying something that’s maybe a little intimidating. I hope that this tutorial and the YouTube video made it easy. If you do have any questions, please feel free to ask me either in the comments here or on YouTube. I love to help!
About the Cheesy Cheese Designs
You know I couldn’t just stop with just TWO cheesy sayings for these cheese spreaders, so I did make SIX MORE designs for a total of EIGHT cheesy cheese designs. These extra designs are bundled together and available for a great price in my Well Crafted Studio Shop. I’d love to have you grab all eight cheesy sayings! They’d be great DIY wedding gifts, Valentine’s gifts (add a bottle of wine and some cheeses for a night to remember), and a wedding shower. Let’s face it- they’re just fun. So go ahead and make them for yourself and have a cheesy cheese celebration!
The drawings I did in Procreate, an iPad drawing app. If you would like to know more about Procreate, I feature it in several of my posts. I’d recommend you start with How to Draw Stickers from Photos in Procreate (to cut on your Cricut), How to Draw Snowflakes in Procreate, and then move on to How to Draw Stickers. I LOVE being able to add my own original doodles to my Cricut design library.
Tips for Engraving Your Own Text
If you would like to engrave your own text on these spreaders, then you’ll want to pay attention to a couple of things.
One is to choose text that is readable when small. I love the fun and funky fonts and initially used a sans that I thought was easy to read. But, when I tried engraving with it, I saw it wasn’t as readable as I had hoped.
The other thing to remember is that if you are using a script font, you have to weld the letters together. Attaching doesn’t do the job, you have to weld!
For More Inspiration!
Excited? Sweet! Nervous? I wrote a book that will help you solve the problems you may have, and will help you discover what’s possible with the Cricut Maker Engraving Tool. Sign up for my email list to get a special offer on this book.
If you’re all excited now to find your next project, then you’ll definitely want to check out my other posts on engraving with the Cricut Maker’s Engraving Tool. I have YouTube videos for how to engrave vintage spoons to make bookmarks and stainless steel servers that walk you through each. The engraved Christmas cookie spatula tutorial I wrote is a guest post on Jennifer Maker’s blog, and she made a great video to go with it! So make sure you check that out as well.
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If you found this tutorial helpful please like the YouTube video above, leave a comment or share this article or its pin. I super appreciate your help! And I can’t wait to see your creations on social media so make sure you tag #wellcraftedstudio so that I take a look! Thanks for reading-
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Hallo
Kun je de messen en taartschep naar het graveren gewoon gebruiken? Of moet je dan nog iets doen?
Gr Petra
Hallo Petra,
Je kunt ze gebruiken zoals ze zijn. Je hoeft niets speciaals met ze te doen. beantwoordt dat jouw vraag?
-Jen