Using Spellbinders Nestabilities with the Big Shot die cut machine

Focal Framed using Nestabilities dies

The multipurpose platform that comes with the Big Shot makes this pretty easy:

The basics -- Nestabilities are considered a "wafer-thin" die, so you cut them with all tabs closed, and sandwiched as shown on the picture on the platform.

• Place an acrylic mat on top of tab 2, then your die (cutting side up), then your paper/cardstock to be cut, then another acrylic mat -- and run it through the machine. This cuts your paper or cardstock. Now, DON'T remove the paper from inside the die yet, we want to emboss it!  
• Pick up the die with the paper or cardstock still in it, fold one tab back and make your embossing sandwich.  Place an acrylic mat on tab 1, then your die with paper/cardstock still in it (cutting side up), then your silicone rubber and impressions pad (that comes with the texturz kit).  Run it through your Big Shot and your item is embossed.  

If you don't have the texturz kit with the silicone rubber & empressions pad, you can still emboss your nestabilities.  Pull all tabs back, place an acrylic mat on the platform, place your die with paper/cardstock in it next (cutting side up), place Spellbinders two tan embossing mats next, and finish with another acrylic mat. Run this through the machine and it will be embossed.  If you don't have Spellbinders embossing mats, you can cut down a silicone baking mat and use that!

Taking the next step -- You can use a magnetic sheet to hold your Spellbinders Nestabilities dies in place so you can cut and emboss two at once to create a frame.  Since this is a bit thicker, you may not want to run it through in the same sandwich as before - you don't want to stress your Big Shot.  Perhaps it is best to fold back one of the tabs before you cut it. Since magnetic sheets vary in thickness, you will need to experiment a bit to see what works best, adding cardstock on top of the last acrylic pad until it is thick enough to cut on tab 1. For the magnetic sheet that I used, I cut it on tab 1 with 4 thicknesses of cardstock added on top of the final acrylic mat. This shows what it looked like after cutting and embossing it:

I used this to frame the focal in the card above.  I used a pen to draw along the raised embossing to help it stand out better.  This focal used 4 sizes of the "Petite Scalloped Ovals Large" nestabilities. The smallest and the 3rd smallest were used to cut the frame shown above. The one between those two sizes was used to cut the picture that went behind the frame, and the one just larger than the largest used for the frame was used to cut the dark mat.