Badge Making Tutorial on the Badge-a-Minit

I am very lucky to have been the recipient of a badge maker for my birthday this year. After talking about badges for some time, and dreaming up designs, I am so excited to be able to finally get started. Eeee! (Thank you extended family for an extremely extravagant and thoughtful pressie - this is definitely a birthday and Christmas 2008, at least!)

Not one to procraftinate, I decided to get stuck in straight away, and made my first few this week on a delightful afternoon off. The badge-a-minit is an excellent quality machine, but the instructions are not particularly detailed, so I thought I'd show you how I made the badges.
The machine I have (isn't she a beauty?) is a 35mm - I think I can use smaller badge parts, too, but I haven't tried those as yet. This means that your paper circles need to be 50mm in diameter, as how you have to allow for some overhang.

First up, cut out your patterns with a punch or a cutter, like this one. If you use the cutter, make sure you put a strong mat underneath, as the blade is sharp.
Then you have some flat circles to get started with. I'm using some fruit labels paper that I adore.
Badges need three component parts - and you'll have to excuse the blurry photo here, I got quite excited by this stage! The first, on the left is the silver button front. The middle part is the pinback and the plastic round sits on the front.Step one: Move the white slider to the left.
Step two: Place the silver front piece face up flat on the round, so it looks like the image below.

Step three: Place your image in next, and finish off with the plastic cover. (You can't see it too well here, but it just sits on top.Step four: Slide the white part under the main stamping column. (I have no idea if that's what it's really called, but you know what I mean!)
Step five: Slowly and gently press the handle of the machine down until you hear a faint click. When you lift it up again, the metal front, the paper and the plastic front should be all caught on the top of the column.Step six: Put your pin back in the right hand side. Make sure you line up the pin with the way the image is oriented. (So that when you go to pin the badge on, the image is the right way up.)
Step seven: Slide the white part back underneath the column and press the handle down again.Ta da! Fruity badges! This set is available in the shop right now, and I'll keep you posted on the new ones as they are made!