A lot of crafters struggle needlessly with cutting unusual or complex shapes from paper, cardstock and fabric with scissors because they never learned the proper technique:
MOVE THE MATERIAL, NOT THE SCISSORS
You will have SO much more control, and you won’t feel like you’re coming down with carpal tunnel syndrome.
This is a technique that is best shown and not told, so I’m inserting a YouTube video from accomplished crafter Jennifer Martinelli. In it, she goes through several basic paper cutting techniques but what I want you to notice is how, no matter what shape she’s cutting, she moves the PAPER, not the SCISSORS. Of course she has to move the scissors a little bit to get the proper angle for each cut, but it’s primarily the paper that’s moving in this video, not her scissors hand.
Move the video progress slider to the 1:18 mark to pick up where she begins a very curly kind of cut. It demonstrates the ‘move the paper, not the scissors’ technique beautifully.
One more thing: keep your scissors sharp. Did you know Fiskars not only makes excellent scissors, but some equally excellent and easy to use sharpeners that work with any lightweight stainless steel scissors with the same design as Fiskars’? I have both of the two pictured below; I keep the little one (top image — it’s enlarged to show detail, but actually measures under 4″ square) in my sewing kit and the big one in the kitchen junk drawer. They’re very easy to use and come with instructions.
The little one will currently run you just under $7 on Amazon, and the big one, just under $11. Sharp scissors are a Lazy Crafter necessity, so you really ought to have at least one of these two in your craft stash.
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