Most of my jars are not smooth sided, and labels don't stick very well to the bumpy glass. Instead, I use a round that is 2 inches in diameter and fits nicely on regular mouth lids. Because the lids get tossed after the jar is emptied, the label doesn't need to be removed. I bought some special custom labels some years ago, before a simple 2 inch diameter rounds were not available anywhere. Because they were custom, I chose a glossy, heavier paper, and it works great with inkjet or laser printers (I have both). I use Print Shop to make my labels and have added colorful backgrounds, and even 'water marks' that state "please return the empty jars". This way, when I give some jars away, the lucky person can get a friendly reminder that returning the empty jar is appreciated. Simetimes, because of this, they will get a nice new goodie from me, for their conservation efforts. My labels are also 'full bleed' which means printing goes out beyond the edges of teh rounds. The initial label graphic is about 2 1/4 inches in diamter, so its just a matter of adjusting edge spacing to get ful coverage on every 2 inch round on a 12 round sheet. My custom sheets had to be ordered by a 1000 sheet quantity minimum. I might have 200 sheets left now, which tells me that I do a LOT of canning.

John, thanks for that tip. I've ordered from Online Labels several times, some removeable labels and lid labels, but missed these. I especially like those larger labels which allow for listing ingredients, "Please Refrigerate," that sort of thing.

Carol

Ken writes: Most of my jars are not smooth sided, and labels don't stick very well to the bumpy glass.

Which is why I have been buying Golden Harvest jars the last couple of years. ($6.50 per case of pints at Big Lots) Most of the time I want to list all the ingredients on the labels and is hard to fit on a 2" round. And I don't care if I get the jars back or not. If I did as much canning as you do then I might change my mind.

Carol,

"Please Refrigerate" I need to start adding something like that. Chile-heads seem to have a habit of leaving bottles of homemade hot sauce out on the table like a bottle of catsup.

A little off topic...

Sometimes I include one of those Ball plastic storage caps with the gift jars. The other day I was thinking why not remove the ring and screw one on. It broke the lid seal!

jt

John, I do that with plastic caps here too, but just gently screw on the plastic cap so it doesn't break the lid seal. I could fit almost anything on the 2 inch rounds. I can use a font size down to about 5, and have the ingredients in a circular ring around the edges of the round labels. As a gag, my dad had bought a 100 cummed 2 inch by 3 inch square labels. The title on them read the following:
"Rogers Pickle Works
Made By Our Own Dirty Hands"

Kind of a turn off some some though..

Ken,

That's disgusting!! My labels are much more

John,

For years I've wanted a waterproof printable label for making plant labels. One question remains. Will the ink fade in sunlight? I believe it will.

Would you be willing to run a test for me, exposing a printed label to sunlight and weather for a few months?

Jim

Jim,

It's going to fade I expect. The John Henry Co. used to make nursery marking pens that were truly permanent. I make my plant tags out of aluminum blinds and nylon kite string. The blinds can be cut to size with a scissors and then use a paper punch for the string hole. I ink the labels with a nursery marking pen and then go over the letters with my Dremel etching tool. Use without the strings in my seed-starting cells & later attach either to the plant or the plant container.

I'll print a label and stick it on a south window. Who knows, it just might turn out to be the perfect plant label!

JohnT

Yes, and thats why he made them, so that people could have something to talk about when he gave them a jar. Obviously you aren't aware of my dads sense of humor.. My cousin never heard of a cumquat jam, and when he trid to give her a jar, she said ugh, never knowing what it was. Later, she spread some of the same thing on toast and was begging him for more.

And obviously you do not know mine. :) I was kidding about being disgusting.

My mom used to hate to make all this stuff and then my dad would give it all away. I had about 60 bottles of home made wine stored here for a long while. When I went to look for a few bottles years later, I asked my dad where they all went. He told me the next door neighbor asked for a couple of bottles. I asked him how many was a couple? He didn't realize that the guy next door would come by for most any flimsy excuse just to pocket a few bottles in a long coat he wore. These mooching people are now gone, their house was condemmed after they were without electricty for over a year, and their septic system failed. I had to call the board of health on them. Now, there stands a new two story house, with 9 rooms.

Ken - Wow - now that's one way to get rid of the neighbors, give em "hooch" until they can't keep up. Way to go.

About labels tho - I ordered some sticky paper from the "Online Labels.com" folks yesterday (after reading your posts) and now wonder if you have any helpful suggestions/ideas about downloading from their free label printing software.

I have "Word" on my computer and whatever it is capable of doing in that regard, also "Picture It" for saving my camera pics, etc., so could decorate OK.

I'm not looking for anything too sophisticated yet, but would like to make round top labels for the regular sized half pint and pint sized lids. I use these mostly in my particular canning equipment. I figured buying the solid sticky backed paper would allow me to use it for other labels as well - postal, etc. That's why I'm hoping the "Online Label" folks software would be useful.

John T - about those bottle tops - are they sealed? Would like to see a company that sells bottles and tops that can be used in preserving either water bath or pressure canned - are there such available?

Thanks again for this interesting post -

Bejay

I like using Print Shop as the program of choice. It allows me to customize the sheet of labels of any size, shape, spacing, etc. It can accept photos, graphics, and text of all kinds. I tried using MS Word, but it was just too much work to try and get positioning right. Initially, when I made my fist 2 inch rounds, I defined the main object as being a 2 inch circle. When these were printed with the proper spacing, it was very hard to get the circles to print exactly within the confines of the 2 inch cut circles, and I wasted several sheets. Because of this, I now have the object size at 2 1/4 inch diameter and so there is 1/8 of and inch of error I can easily deal with. Also, I print to a sheet of plain paper and hold this up to strong light, while positioning a blank sheet of labels over the printed paper. This way, I can see exactly where the printing is placed on the pages, without wasting a sheet of labels. I ust have 300 various sheets of left over labels, that I use in future canning. I also manually write in a two digit year date at the bottom of each, so I know when the items they are placed on were made.

I have Print Shop 21 & PrintMaster 11, but prefer the worldlabel.com Label Designer for round labels. You can fine tune placement with all of them. One advantage of the Broderbund products (the first two) is that there is a support forum.

Bejay,

Are you talking about the below? If so, they do not form a tight seal and in fact some leak if you turn jar upside down. You can't use them for canning, but pretty nice on opened jars either screwed down over a regular metal lid (won't leak that way) or just by themselves.

jt

Here is a link that might be useful: Plastic storage caps

Another source for labels that I've had great success with is Labelsbythesheet.com.

You can buy one sheet of several different kinds to experiment with, then order the ones you like.

Quick shipping too. I usually have them within a week!

Deanna

Here is a link that might be useful: Labels by the sheet

Been playing with my new label web site - "Online Labels.com" all morning.

Ken - I agree the smaller lids need the 2-1/4 in. circle dimension - that was my "first" hurdle. I still have not received the blank sheet of sticy paper - but is ordered. So will have to wait until arrival --- for more fun. Dontya just love computers!

I think I have the 2 size templates that the website allows its members to download. Your right, "Word" can be a bit frustrating when it comes to positioning, etc., but as I use it sparingly, don't feel any further upgrading of this particular program is warranted. I did find however, when I tried to save the template - as you are allowed to do - it had to be re-opened in my Adobe Reader file PDF format, but it still went to print OK.

Perhaps after I play around with these for awhile, I will wind up just ordering the circles already to go - perforated and everything.

Just my 2 c's.

Thanks Deanna - will check out the link.

Bejay

My version 20 of Print Shop has had a few bugs in it, and its sometimes frustrating to have to deal with them. Now that version 21 is out, I do hope it was improved enough. The other issue I have is it on a DVD disk which my system can't read yet.. When purchasing labels on sheets, make sure that you select a type that has all the paper waste (around the edges of the cut labels) left intact. If these areas are removed and only the labels are left attached with the whole non stick backing sheet, the labels can accidentially peel off and stick to internal parts of the printers. I used to service laser printers and customer asked why the prining had an odd square in the pages. When I removed the toner cartridge, it had a sticky label attached to the light sensitive image drum, and couldn't be removed without damage. Its even worse with an ink jet printer!

Speaking of inkjet printers - I have a Deskjet Hewlett Packard - that has driven me batty for over the past year. It seems to be in the feeder rollers. When I accessed Hewlett's website, they said to clean the rollers with distilled water - which I did. No change.

The durned thing will sputter and try to load the paper, then give a red reject light. If I punch the light a few times, it will go ahead and print --- sometimes. Usually, it takes several tries.

A few days ago, I tried moving the rollers back and forth -that feed the paper, and they seemed to be stuck to the axle - and this seems to have helped a lot. I didn't think oil would be a good idea but is there something that can be used on the axle to help the rollers a bit. I think they get stuck and then wear down so they can't grab the paper.

If you have suggestions, would certainly be grateful.

Bejay

A lint free alchol wipe. The kind they use for cleaning an injection area for insulin. I also have a special rubber rejuvinator in a small bottle and its wiped onto as much of the rubber feed rollers that you have access to. HP does offer exchange programs on some printers. My office Jet is huge, color and black cartridges are about $60 for the pair, and after 2 years a paper guide broke off when the print head hit it. I sent back that base part and they exchanged it. It had a 3 year service plan which is now passed. Once it craps out, its history. Its sometims cheaper to get a new replacement than to get the old one fixed. No one will repair an HP inkjet as they are not user serviceable, and there are no legal repair sites. HP just exchanges them at a cost. The site below has a spray can with a long thin tube. You need to remove any paper lint as well as any 'shine' on the feed rollers. Don't attempt to rotate the rollers as they are on a geared shaft and can damage the gears. Run a few sheets of paper though while you spray the rollers. Just print blank pages so the print head stays put.
The stuff I used before is here:
http://www.westlake-electronic.com/store/search/1/detail/1/item_no/TECH10012/index.htm

Good luck

Here is a link that might be useful: Roller cleaner spray

Maybe this is a stupid question but does it make a big difference to have the labels be waterproof? Our local office supply store carries Avery labels both waterproof and basic mailing labels. Do the waterproof really make that big of a difference for the cost? If so, I'm interested as this is great for gift-giving this time of year. =)

Currently, I've been writing on the lids w/ marker- item & date. For gift-giving am using the basic 2" mailing labels (500 for $9 at WalMart) and MS. Word which is a pain for designing. I've picked them up with wet hands and ran them under water to simulate being left out in the rain and the color only faded and did not really bleed. Since I usually put fabric around the top before giving away I prefer labels that stick to the jar.
-Laura

I didn't know Avery made waterproof labels for inkjets. Will check it out next time I go to town even though very happy with the online ones.

Laura,

Waterproof is important to me. They just look and hold up better with use. A lot of my labels go on shakers and phials that are constantly fingered and palmed.

And I have a correction to make. The new waterproof labels from Online are very hard to remove after they have set up. They were coming off rather easily if I immediately removed to reposition a crooked one, but after a couple days they are impossible to remove and reuse. They don't tear, but leave all the adhesive behind. I noticed that I had an incorrect ingredient amt so had to redo 11 salsa labels. Uff da!

jt

The waterproof type papers are usually meant for photos in an inkjet printer. It would depend if your planning on exposing the labels to a lot of moisture during storage. Even for that, if the paper on the labels isn't waterproof, the printing will usually stay quite well after it dries a few hours. My labels are glossy and so I must allow them to dry a couple of hours prior to applying to the jar lids. If I don't wait, they can smear a bit. Heat will usually soften the adhesive on labels, making them a bit easier to remove. If you want to get all the sticky gunk off, a product called 'Goo Gone' works very well at dissolving most any adhesive. I use it here to remove sticky things off plastic as it doesn't harm them at all. Its orange/citrus based, and is kind to hands.

After this discussion I think will buy the waterproof kind. Thanks guys! I love all your cute designs- you all way more creative than I, the functional one! =)

Ksroger,
my husband (garage king) says that peanut butter works as good as "Goo Gone" but doesn't have the pleasant orange smell. Can work in a pinch, though. =)

Olive oil works to remove "gunk" too. Spray a little on the goo, let sit overnight, then rub to get it to ball up (or some will feel brittle and lift right off), wipe with a paper towel. Wash as usual to remove the last of the oil.

Deanna

Goo Gone works in a few minutes. When I coat the fake apple decoys during the apple growing season, they get a 'Tangle Trap' coating which is extremely sticky and dill not wash off with soap or water. Instead, it breaks down by applying vegetable oil to it, and then soap and water get rid of the oil. I have even used Good Gone to remove magic marker. Applying heat to sticky labels does seem to help though as they can either set up better or can be easier to remove due to the adhesive being heated.

Ken - I'm a bit late with this (just back from grandson's wedding in Fla).

My roller spray arrived while I was gone, and so I spent several hours yesterday cleaning and spraying the rollers on my HP printer. I have to say, it worked just great. It seems to have solved another problem as well - that of spewing out 3 or 6 blank pages before printing.

Today, I printed out the glossies from the wedding, and the printer didn't even hiccup.

Thanks ever so much. Now I will do the other printer (another older HP) that has been having similar problems.

I wonder how many folks know that this solution exists? The HP website doesn't mention it.

The name again - "Blow-Off" and it certainly did.

Bejay

Here, HP laser printers, which are more of a higher ended, higher page count type, have removable feed rollers as well as a removable seperation roller. If my laserjet 4 has paper feed problems, and the cleaner doesn't work anymore, I would have to replace the rollers instead. They just snap on the end of a shaft. Inkjet printers have rosd the full length and rollers are usually molded onto them. If they fail, which is when they wear down some, they are very hard to remove and lots of parts need disassembly before getting to the root of the problem. Many years ago, in the older HP laser jet 2 and 3 models, they wre also long shafts and were a little laborous to replace, but the whole thing didn't need disassembly. I would expect that after about 10000 pages, the injets will start to get fussy. Glossy paper stock is also a bit harder to pick up and push through the printers internals. If the cleaner is an aerosol can, be very careful you don't spray, as too many other things are nearby. HP is out to make money, inks and toners are their money makers. Just like Polaroid years ago, sold cheap cameras for their expensive film.