Updated on July 23, 2024

Can you believe 2017 is already almost over? This year flew by! I am starting to think ahead to the new year and getting organized. I am a big planner girl. Even though I love technology and need my Google calendar for work planning, I am a paper planner all the way. Today, I am going to share some tips on how to create your own planner stickers using your Cricut Explore.

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Over the years I have gone from purchasing a planner at my local Target or Walmart, to really getting into the world of high-end planners. I started with an Erin Condren Life Planner. I used that for several years, but I wanted a way to add and remove pages. I tried out the Happy Planner, but wanted something with a little more structure and goal planning. This year I have been using Inkwell Press inserts in an A5 binder. I have really loved this, but with combining both my work and personal life, I need more space for my daily to-dos. So in 2018, I plan on using an Emily Ley Simplified Daily Planner.

If you have entered into the world of planners, you know that stickers and embellishments for your planner are very popular right now. They can get really pricey to purchase if you are buying a lot of them, and you can’t always get exactly what you want. I love to create my own stickers using my Cricut Explore.

If you sign up for a Cricut Access subscription you gain access to over 30,000+ images. I love not having to purchase a bunch of individual images to create large stickers sheets with lots of different images. You can grab the images you want from any cartridge you want that are included in your plan. All the subscriptions also include a ton of amazing fonts to choose from. If you are into planning and creating customized designs for your planner, there are currently four planner cartridges included with the Standard and Premium Access subscriptions – Cutie Planner Pieces, Everyday Planner Pieces, Playful Planner Pieces, and Whimsical Planner Pieces.

Cricut Planner Stickers

Supplies:

• Cricut Explore Air 2
• Light Grip Map
• Printable Vinyl
• Printer

To start designing planner stickers with your Cricut machine, open up a new project in Cricut Design Space. Add a square shape and resize it to 6.75″ x 9.25″. This is the area you have to work with when designing a print then cut project. I like to change the color to white.

Click on the Image button and search for whatever you want for your stickers.

Add White Space Around an Image to Create Stickers

The default for when you convert an image that is normally cut out to a print then cut image is that it will cut around the details of the entire image. So, for example, if you have letters, it will cut out the hole in the letter A, D, O and so on. When I use stickers in my planner, I don’t want each little part of the sticker cut out. I simply want the outside border of the sticker to be cut out. To do this, you have to get a little creative.

Start by choosing a design that has a background shadow on it.  I am creating a sticker sheet for yearly celebrations, so I found the words “Father’s Day”. Many times the shadow will be hidden on the layers when you add the image.

To unhide it, click on the eye next to the shadow shape.

Ungroup all of the layers of the image, and move the very bottom shadow image so you can work with it.

Note: Sometimes you will find that you have a solid shadow already. With this type of design, simply recolor your background shadow to whatever color you want. My go-to for stickers is white to match the printable vinyl.

If you don’t have a solid shadow you need to do a little work. Start by adding a square shape.

Click on the lock in the bottom left corner to resize the square to a rectangle. Then, use the arrow in the bottom right corner to resize the rectangle to cover up the white spaces inside your image shadow. You may need to add multiple squares in various sizes to cover up all the holes.

Once you have all the inner white spaces covered, select all the squares plus the shadow image and click Weld. This will create a solid shape. I then usually recolor the shadow shape white.

If there are multiple layers in your original image, select them all and then click Group. This will keep them all together when you move them. Then select the group of layers plus the shadow and click Align > Center. This will line everything up perfectly.

While still having everything selected, click Flatten. This will create a print then cut image that will has a white border around the outside but leave everything inside the border whole.

Note: I chose a dark background square so you can see the welded shadow image has a white solid background. If you omit the above steps and simply flatten the original image, you will get the bottom one. It will cut around each individual letter rather than the outline of the entire sticker. 

Celebrations Stickers

Continue doing this to add shapes to your design until you have your sticker sheet filled up. Once you are finished designing, click select all and attach to keep the images aligned on the sheet you will be printing.

Helpful tip: If you choose not to attach the images, your stickers will print in the most space saving way possible on your sticker sheet rather than where you have them placed.

Make it Now: Simply click on the image or link below to customize or make your own Celebrations Stickers.

Cricut Design Space File: Celebration Stickers

Click the green Make It button. Make sure your mat looks good, and click the green Continue button.

Load your printable vinyl into your printer. Click on the green Print It button. Be sure to select your printer. I like to leave the bleed on to make sure everything cuts perfectly, but you can choose to turn this off.

Load your printed vinyl onto your cutting mat, and set the Smart Set Dial to Custom. Choose Printable Vinyl from the menu.

Load your mat into the machine and click Go.

Once everything is cut out you can add your stickers to your planner.

Daily Planner Stickers

I also created a second file of stickers to use in your daily or weekly planning. There are page flags, days of the week, mini flags, and more. I created this file in much the same way as the celebrations stickers. I used the Duplicate and Align tools to get everything lined up nicely.

For example, here are the steps I used to create the days of the week stickers.

1. Click Images and select the ones you want to use. I chose circle stickers with the days of the week in each one from the Everyday Planner Pieces cartridge. (Be sure to select the printable image and not the cut image. It will have a little printer by the i in the right corner.).
2. Recolor and resize each of the circles. Mine are 0.5″ wide.
3. Line up the stickers in a vertical row from Sunday to Saturday.
4. Select All and use the Align tool to Center Horizontally. Then click on Distribute Vertically. This will space them evenly from top to bottom.
5. On the layers panel, select Group to keep everything together. Click on your group and right-click to Duplicate. Repeat the duplication process until you have as many as you want. I choose to create five rows of stickers.
6. Select All and use the Align tool to Align Top. Then click on Distribute Horizontally. This will space out the rows evenly from left to right. Click on Group on the layers panel to keep all the stickers together as you move them around.

I used these same steps for each of the designs on these planner stickers.

Helpful tip: When designing stickers be sure to flatten every image you use.

Make it Now: Simply click on the image or link below to customize or make your own 2018 Daily Planner Stickers.

Cricut Design Space: 2018 Daily Planner Stickers

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You may also like:

• How to Create Planner Stickers with Your Cricut
• How to Make Planner Charms
• How to Create a Weekend Banner Sticker with Cricut Design Space

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Cricut. The opinions and text are all mine.