One of the things I've been most excited about having our own house is being able to plant a veggie patch again.
You may remember that we had a plot in our local community garden when we lived in Berkeley, but as great as that was, there's nothing quite like having fresh veggies, herbs and fruit growing right outside your back door. Walking out the back door to pick herbs for a last minute addition to dinner is convenient. Walking to the park at night to do the same; not so much. So finally having our own garden space, in our yard, was a dream come true.
By the time we were settled into our new house last year it was too late in the season to start growing a veggie patch, so we had to wait until Spring rolled around to start our garden. And by Spring, I mean mid-May as it's not uncommon for it to snow here up until early May! While we waited for consistently warm days to arrive to get planting, I got to work building garden beds, filling them with soil, paving between the beds with pebbles and working on our compost bin.
I also got to work thinking about all the little finishing touches, like plant labels. Sure, I could've just stuck with the labels that came with each of my seedling plants, but why do that when you can make something cute? The kids LOVE everything Kawaii at the moment, so I had the idea of making cutesy Kawaii plant labels. Little fruits and veggies with happy little faces smiling up at me from the veggie patch. A little touch to make the veggie garden an even happier place.
Aren't they cute?
Making my kawaii plant labels was a breeze thanks to my handy little Cricut Joy. First I designed the various fruits and veggies in Photoshop (that was the hardest part) and then I cut them out on permanent Smart Vinyl with my Cricut Joy before sticking them onto bamboo plant labels. Easy peasy!
With no need for a cutting mat, Cricut Smart Vinyl is such an easy to use product for projects like this. No need to line it up perfectly on a cutting mat. Just load the Smart Vinyl into the Cricut Joy and you're done! The Smart Vinyl used here adheres permanently and is water proof making it perfect for use in the garden.
If you'd like to make your own kawaii plant labels follow the simple instructions below. I've made it even easier for you by sharing my designs on the Cricut Design Space, so you won't need to spend time designing them.
Here's what you'll need:
Cricut Joy
Cricut Smart Vinyl Permanent in black
Bamboo Plant labels
Cricut Weeding Tools
Tweezers
My Kawaii Plant Label Designs (click here)
Step 1.
Click the link for my Kawaii Plant Label Design above. This will take you through to a new project in the Cricut Design Space. If you'd like to cut the same fruits and vegetables that I used, simply click "Make it" and skip ahead to Step 2. If you'd like to pick and choose from my designs, or cut multiple of the same design, click "Customize". This will take you to the canvas. Here you can change the individual design sizes if needed, delete the designs you don't need, or add extras of any design you need more of. Once you're done click "Make it".
Step 2.
A pop up screen will ask "How will you load all of your materials for this project?". Select "Without Mat" from the list of options and click "Done".
Step 3.
A review page will open up showing the design and the cut details. On the left hand side it will show you how much Smart Vinyl you will need for the cut. Cut a piece of Smart Vinyl to this length. Click "Continue" once you are ready to cut.
Step 4.
The next page will ask you to choose your material. Select "Smart Vinyl" from the list.
Step 5.
Load your piece of Smart Vinyl into your Cricut Joy and click "Go" on the screen. The machine will now cut your design.
Step 6.
Once the design has been cut, remove the excess vinyl from the sheet. You'll be left with the shapes of the fruits and vegetables.
Step 7.
Using your weeding tool and tweezers, carefully remove the kawaii fruits and vegetable designs from the sheet and place them on the bamboo plant labels. As the designs are quite small this will be a little fiddly, so make sure you have good light and work carefully. Take extra care with the small pieces such as eyes and smile. Because the designs are fairly small you should be able to smooth them down easily with your finger, but if you need a little help making them smooth, the scraper tool comes in handy.
Now, I originally designed these to just be the outlines, however when I removed the outlines from the Smart Vinyl sheet, I realized that the shapes left by the negative space were pretty cute too. This also meant that for each design I got two plant labels. Two for one!
Once your designs have been placed on the bamboo plant labels, the only thing left to do is stick them in your garden! Look at those little smiley faces!
Aren't these just the happiest little plant labels? They make me smile when I see them in my garden. I'm really pleased with how they turned out and it was such an easy project thanks to my Cricut Joy.
I'll be making more designs and updating my project in the Cricut Design Space as we plant more fruits and veggies throughout the year, so make sure to stay tuned for more little smiles!
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