For a few years now, at Christmas time, we try and make something homemade as a gift for our families. It gives a personal touch to a well thought out gift. Our first Christmas together as a married couple, Sierra and I wanted to make pepper jelly which we ended up naming “Toe Jam”. Sounds gross but the making of pepper jelly did not smell so great, it reminded us of stinky feet. I promise it tasted good.

This year we decided to try our hand at making homemade blueberry syrup, which in itself is not difficult at all; you can find any number of recipes on the internet. To make it a more personal gift we decided to try our hand at glass etching the bottles.

Step 1:

Using the Cricut Maker design software, I created a basic label with our family name and a few “frilly bits”. The design process was actually really easy, Cricut Design Space helps you specificy which lines to cuts and how to format the images. Personally, I was really proud of how the label turned out especially when I saw it cut out on vinyl.

Step 2:

We found the easiest way to correctly place the vinyl cutouts on the bottles was to use a little clear transfer tape. Once the vinyl was in place we took a foam brush and applied a generous coat of the glass etching cream to the exposed areas. It is important to be careful to not get any of the etching cream on your skin, it can cause burns.

Step 3:

After letting the etching cream sit on the stencil for about 15 minutes, all we had to do was rinse the bottle sunder running water and remove the stencil. Apart from my error in removing a few vitals parts of  a few of the letters, the etch came out really clean and sharp.

The filled bottles turned out great and we are super proud of how easy using the Cricut made the whole process super easy, from the design to the stencil. As first time Cricut users, I’m stoked we were able to make something that looked store bought but was homemade. The only change we would have made was to paint the etch with t-shirt screen printing ink so you could see the design better.

I will say it was so user friendly. I was a little overwhelmed when I got it out of the box but was so amazed  at how quickly I was able to figure it out. Don’t be shocked by the fancy lid and shiny exterior. 

Merry Christmas!