Craft Edge

looking for a tutorial on how to fill a shape (say a circle) with smaller shapes (small stars). is there a way to do this in inkscape? I also have access to corel draw 13 if you know of a tutorial for that

I don't know of a tutorial, but I know which feature and how to do it in general so maybe that will give you some more search terms.
You click on your star(s) and click object>pattern>object to pattern and then click on the circle and then click object>pattern>pattern to object and the circle should fill with stars. There is a little node by the original star that you can drag to change how the pattern looks on the finished circle. It is fun to play with.

thank you--will try it.