Loading A Save - Universal-Team/LeafEdit GitHub Wiki
Now that you backed up your savefile, we can start going to LeafEdit.
If this is your first time, it will download the needed assets to work with LeafEdit such as spritesheets etc.

Now go to Editor and READ THE WARNING PROMPT. WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY MISTAKES YOU DO.
After that's done, you'll find the savebrowse, press B 2 times, and you'll be inside the 3ds folder. After it, go to Checkpoint -> saves -> <Title Folder> -> <Your entered Savename>. Press A on your ANIMAL CROSS.sav, garden.dat or garden_plus.dat.

Now it creates a backup, depending on, if you have backups enabled in the Settings. It is enabled by default.

Now it loads the item, villager database, spritesheets and more, after it, you'll be in the Editor Main Screen.

When you are done with editing your save, PRESS on the SAVE icon.