How to Cut Large Stencils with Your Silhouette CAMEO

Learn How to Cut Large Stencils with Your Silhouette CAMEO in this week’s Silhouette Saturday + a free cut file!

Cutting large stencils with my CAMEO is one of my favorite things to do. I often make large signs and create big stencils for my husband when he makes corn hole boards. It’s actually really simple to do. I’m sure there are many ways to do it but this is my personal tried and true method!

I’ll show you how to do it step-by-step using this large wood sign I made as the example. It’s roughly 25 inches by 30 inches in size.

What You’ll Need:

• Silhouette CAMEO
• 12×24 Cutting Mat
• 12×12 Scrapbook Paper (Tip: Pick up cheap big packs in the clearance section.)
• Tape
• Repositionable Stencil Spray (I use Krylon Easy-Tack)
• Spouncer
• Paint
• Paper Flowers (mine are from the $1 bins at Michael’s)
• Tacky glue
• Design used: Hand-Drawn Feminine Deer* (Click to download)

*Notes on cut file: 

• The cut file is for personal use only. I drew it by hand and created a cut file. For commercial use on anything you sell, please contact me about obtaining a limited commercial license. 
• Please note this is a .studio3 file. If you haven’t updated your software, you need to do that first to be able to use this. It’s always a good idea to keep your software up to date! You can update it here.
• To open the design, open Silhouette Studio first. Then use File>Open and select the saved cut file.

Step One: Open the cut file in Silhouette Studio. In page settings, change to page and mat size to 12×24. Size the deer to 22″ tall and allow about half the deer to hang off the page. (See image below Step 3 for a visual).

Step Two: Tape two pieces of the scrapbook paper together and place on 12×24 mat. Cut using the 65lb patterned paper cut setting.

Step Three: Flip the deer with the green rotate tool as shown below. (hold down shift while you do it for a perfectly even flip). Repeat step two to cut the other half of the deer.

Step Four: Piece your stencil together with tape to create one large stencil.

Step Five: Spray back of stencil with Krylon Easy Tack and allow about 60 seconds for it to get tacky before applying to the wood sign.

Step Six: Lightly paint the deer using a spouncer. Peel off stencil while the paint is still wet.

Step Seven: Allow to dry and then glue on flowers.

Does it seem easier than you’d think? It really is!

This is a fairly simple stencil, but you can use the same concept with more intricate designs like we did for this corn hole board set we made! For the letters, it just takes a bit more time to place them all with the Easy-Tack.