This Cake Topper Tutorial combines three different materials to make the cutest dimensional succulent cake topper! You’ll use the knife blade, glitter paper and print and cut with your Cricut Maker.
This is the second tutorial in my Succulent Party Series and it’s something I’ve been wanting to do since Cricut announced the knife blad last year. There are so many things you can make with the knife blade, but I mostly wanted to make a cake topper! And of course, I had to report back to you Cricut Knife Blade Cake Topper Tutorial.
Other Cricut Cake Topper Tutorials
I’ve made a few with paper (for instance, my gem party has one, and so does my Halloween Haunted Mansion party), but chipboard literally adds a whole new dimension to my parties! I felt like these succulent files gave me the perfect excuse to buy a Cricut Knife Blade!
There is a learning curve, but it will be worth it…I mean, look at how pretty that succulent cake topper is! I used my succulent graphics from the Potted Cacti and Succulent SVG Bundle for this tutorial
To make this Cricut Knife Blade Cake Topper, you’ll need:
- Succulent SVG Files from the Potted Cacti and Succulent SVG Bundle
- Cricut Design Space
- Cricut Maker (read more about the Maker here)
- Knife Blade
- Light Grip Mat
- Strong Grip Mat
- Cricut Chipboard
- White Spray Paint
- White Cardstock
- Glitter Cardstock
- Masking Tape
- Printer (I have a laser printer)
- You may use Cricut fonts for your invitation, but I used my own fonts, which you can buy in my Creative Market Store
- Tombow Permanent Adhesive (my FAVORITE adhesive for printables)
- Paper Straws
- Glue Gun
Before reading this tutorial, I highly recommend checking out the Knife Blade Basics series by Hey, Let’s Make Stuff. She was my go-to for all of my knife blade questions. And warning- this is not a quick project. It takes time to cut out chipboard with the Maker.
Cricut Design Space Instructions:
- Create a 4.5″ and 5″ wide hexagon in Cricut Design Space.
- Upload one of the Succulent SVG Files to design space. Tip: check out this tutorial on how to upload SVG Files to Cricut Design Space.
- Size the succulent down so it fits in the hexagon, leaving plenty of room on the sides, then copy and paste the succulent.
- FLATTEN one of the succulent images, then move it to the side.
- Click on the other succulent and go to the contour tool (on the lower right-hand side of your design board).
- Select HIDE ALL CONTOURS, then select the leafy part and the pot of the succulent and click on the X of the contour panel. Tip: Read more about the Cricut Contour Tool.
- Center the contoured succulent onto the smaller hexagon, then click ATTACH. Copy and paste, and change the material color so it doesn’t cut on the same mat. One will be on chipboard, and the other will be on Glitter Cardstock.
- Click the green Make it button to send it to your machine.
- Set your canvas size on the chipboard to 11″ (12″ will be too large).
Cake Topper Assembly Instructions:
- First, print and cut the succulent on a light grip mat, then set aside. Tip: Learn more about print and cut.
- Cut the smaller hexagon on glitter cardstock.
- Switch out the regular blade for the Cricut Knife Blade.
- Now, move the white rollers all the way to the right (to prevent them from making marks in the chipboard).
- Place the Chipboard on the Strong Grip Mat and apply masking tape to the edges of the chipboard.
- Choose chipboard for the material, then load it into the machine. Press the cut button.
- Cricut Design Space will tell you how long your project will take – it could be as long as a couple hours – so do some of your other projects while you wait.
- Once it’s cut all the way through the chipboard, spraypaint all the sides of the chipboard cut out with white paint.
- After it has dried, use the Permanent Adhesive to attach the glitter cardstock to the smaller hexagon.
- Use the adhesive again to attach the smaller hexagon to the larger white hexagon.
- Add adhesive to the back of the print and cut succulent, then place the pieces on the cake topper. It should be attached to the bottom larger hexagon, but showing through the smaller hexagon (like I have it shown).
- Hot glue a paper straw to the back of the cake topper and that’s it!
Whew! That was fun, right? Okay, I was a little stressed out when I made these, but I learned a lot about the Cricut Knife Blade, and the next project should be smooth sailing. Can’t wait to try it with some balsa wood (yes, the Cricut Maker can cut wood with the knife blade)!!!!
I also made some cupcake toppers with this technique (and stay tuned for a tutorial on how to manipulate SVG files for print and cut)!
Other Succulent SVG File tutorials
- Easy Cricut Iron-On Vinyl Succulent T-shirt – I’ll teach you how to move graphics around in Cricut Design Space and what settings to use when you create this adorable t-shirt.
- Make Your Own Invitations from SVG Files in Cricut Design Space – This is similar to this post, but goes a little more in depth. You can definitely combine the techniques from these to posts for your own take on this succulent invitation.
- FREE Cricut Party Banner Template – this party banner template opens up right in Cricut Design Space and it matches perfectly with the invitation template from the tutorial above.
- How to Edit SVG Files for Printables in Cricut Design Space – It’s really easy to Edit SVG Files for Printables in Cricut Design Space. You can do this with SVG Files in Cricut Access, or files that you upload to your design space dashboard.
- Palm Springs Party Ideas – this includes ALL the ideas, so make sure you bookmark it!
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