Okay you say…what does a ruler have to do with rubber stamping? I'm not studying math here! Ahh…but math does come into play when you are measuring to cut your card stock to create the perfect card. Now, I realize I have 2 "camps" with my customers. Some of you (cmon, admit it!) are perfectionsists and need every cut and stamped image to be perfect and if it isn't, you will ruin any number of pieces of card stock to have it turn out exactly right. Then there are those like me; I affectionately refer to this camp as random stampers. We want it to look nice, but it doesn't have to be perfect. The great thing about rubber stamping is there is room for everyone and it is my job as a stampin up demo to help both camps create hand made cards to be proud of. Now…back to our ruler.
Many times in my clubs and classes I have customers ask me "where is 1/4", which line is for 5/8", and so forth. When assembling layered card stock on your projects and scrapbooking layouts, rarely are the measurements at the even inch marks. So, here is a quick refresher which I hope will help you "tame" that ruler and measure things more easily and accurately.
When you look at the marks on a typical ruler, the longest line represents an inch. The next shortest line is the half-inch mark and there is only one of these between each inch mark. The next shortest line is the 1/4" inch mark and there are two of these. The third shortest line is the 1/8" mark and there are four of these. The fourth shortest is the 1/16" mark and there are eight of these. These marks are also the same on most paper trimmers as well.
One thing that helps me speed up my cutting is to mark the measurements I use a lot (like 5 1/2", 4 1/4", 2 3/4") with a permanent marker or white gel pen. That way I can see them quickly and I don't have to count my lines each time.
Leave a comment and share any tips that you've found to make your paper cutting easier!
Anne Brown, 972-234-9118, anne@stampmaven.com
