Once Upon A Time…

If you live in the world of cookies as I do, then you may know that in three weeks CookieCon 2014 is a coming!  It’s a conference for cookie decorators where we all get together in Salt Lake City and talk cookies.  Ladies and a couple of men come from all over the world for the four days and have a ton of fun, learn a little something and yes, eat cookies.  This will be the second edition of CookieCon and it’ll be bigger and better than the first.

Now just like every conference there is a trade show, key note speakers and goodie bags, however, unlike a regular conference there is also a sugar show.  It’s where those who come to the conference can show off their mad skills.  Two years ago I was only a year or so into my cookie adventure and even though I knew I wouldn’t even come close to winning, I brought a few cookies.  These actually:

Now fast forward a year and half and it’s time to create an entry for this year’s show.  The categories are:

• Spring: It’s that time of year - flowers are blooming!
• Once Upon a Time: Let fairy tales, fables, and stories inspire.
• Home Sweet Home: Where are you from? Represent your hometown, state, or country. What makes your home special?
• Anything Goes: Let your imagination run wild! (Must be G or PG rated!)
• Mystery Shape: The shape will be unveiled and decorated at CookieCon!

I had no idea which one I was going to do until I was watching Beauty and The Beast with my girls last week.  As the movie concluded the final stained glass window appeared and I knew then and there that that was my entry.  Now to figure out how to do it.

I turned to my guru of detailed cookies, Mallory of Butterwinks.  It was time to try something out of my comfort range. I posted my idea and Mallory’s encouragement gave me strength to do it.

I rolled and cut my 10” x 6” cookie, then baked it off.  I printed off the window and then sketched it out using my Kopycake overhead projector.  I got some details but left most of the blocks blank.  This took about 40 minutes.

Time to mix the colours. CRAP, so so so so many. UGH, I hate mixing colours, who’s with me???? Maybe if I painted it I’d get better colours and I wouldn’t have to spend hours mixing and mixing and mixing.  Sold!  I used white royal icing and filled it the sections.  I wanted the cookie to have dimension and also thought it would be easier to paint if I sectioned it off.  I was right by the way :)  This took a little over an hour to do. I then let it dry overnight.

Next morning I started to paint.  I used Americolor gels with vodka.  I picked a colour, put a drop on a plate and then used a little vodka to thin for paint and painted.  By mixing the colours this way I could control the intensity and the shades.  This is where I had the most fun.  It took about an hour and a half to do. I’m sure you can do it faster but since painting doesn’t come naturally, I took my time.

Last up was to mix up black piping icing. You want it thick so it holds up but not so thick your hand falls off when piping.  I used a PME 1.0 tip and almost immediately it clogged and I even ran the icing through a sieve prior to putting into the piping bag.  You all know what I mean.  Now I had heard of putting the icing into a pair of nylons and squishing it through but since it was already in the bag it was an extra step this lazy girl didn’t want to take.  I had one pair and yes they were used but they were clean.  DON’T FREAK OUT, THIS COOKIE WAS NEVER GOING TO BE EATEN.  Always use new/unused nylons for this please.  I cut out a square and placed it over the coupler and then secured the tip.  It was brilliant, never clogged again! The beer in the corner was for when I finished :)

Then with the original window blown up on my iPhone next to me,  I piped out the black lines.  This felt like it took all day but probably took an hour and a half.  My back was an unhappy camper after all this bending.  I spent the rest of the day on the floor :(

But it was so worth it because after it dried it looked like this:

Now next to the original window:

And then the best thing happened.  I posted it to my FB page and my world blew up.  In the next 24 hours it was viewed over 25,000 times, reposted 60 times and the comments made me smile from ear to ear so hard my cheeks hurt.

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!!  I made this cookie to see if I could and all this amazing love towards it proved to me that I should continue doing what I do.

Now to get it to CookieCon to show it off in person.  I don’t care if it wins anything at this point because due to all of your love, I already won!

So if you are wondering if you should bring a cookie to the show, do it do it do it.  We all have to start somewhere and it’s not everyday that you’ll be in a room with such amazing people who will support everything you do in the world of cookies! I love my family but they don’t get it, especially when you tell them they can’t eat it before it’s had it’s picture taken.  (you know what I mean, hehehe)

Thanks for looking!

Treat Day Wednesday–Stained Glass Cookies

Well I’ve been making cookies like crazy this week.  Friends of ours just had a baby girl and this upcoming weekend is girls weekend in Washington DC. So I made some cookies.  I also had some extra cookie dough left over and I’ve been kind of fascinated with the stained glass look. With that I took to the extra dough and made these stained glass cookies for Treat Day. 

I used Melissa from MyCakeSchool.com’s technique for stained glass on buttercream on my cookies but used royal icing.  I love the way they turned out, even Rob said they were gorgeous and that’s pretty good since I normally have to urge a comment out of him about my cookies.

Happy Treat Day!

Thanks for looking!

The Challenge! Get out of your comfort zone…

Have you ever just did the safe thing? Always wanted to try something new but chickened out in the end? That’s me when it comes to cookies.

Now that, I think, I’ve got royal icing down. I thought I’d try to challenge myself and this week I gave two new to me decorating techniques a try.  3D cookies and stained glass.

First up, 3D cookies.  So I’ve got a lot of friends who are having babies and instead of the same old bassinet cookies I thought I’d try to make the bassinet out of cookies.  I mean Julia Usher is the queen of these type of cookies and I aspire to be like her. Well you’ve got to start somewhere.  Now practice makes perfect but for the first time I’m pretty happy with how they turned out.

I looked at pictures of bassinets on the web and then made up a template for the end pieces.  Then I cut the rectangular pieces to fit.  I iced them, let them dry and then put the pieces together.  What I didn’t account for was shrinkage.  There were a few gaps that I had to fill in with royal icing.  I also made some minis to put inside the bassinet. All in all I think it turned out pretty cute.  I gave these to a friend down the street who had a baby girl this week.  Congrats Angela and Jeff!

Next up I tried stained glass.  Have you seen Maggie Austin Cake??? They are the most beautiful stained glass painting on cakes ever.  I wanted to try but on a smaller scale.  So I took a small piece of fondant that was the same size as a cookie and gave it a go.  I Google’d Stained Glass hearts and found this pattern.  My impatience gets the better of me and the black wasn’t completely dry when I added the colour.  After the paint dried completely I popped the fondant on the top of a cookie the same size that just came out of the oven.  The fondant melted to the top.  I then piped a shell border in royal icing and gave it a little sheen.  For my next try I’ll have to go bigger, maybe even a cake :)

Ok, so now I need more challenges.  Give me some ideas.  I’m up for anything.  I will attempt the bassinet again, just so I can get it a little more smooth and I’m definitely going to do the painted stained glass on a cake!

Update on my back:  Well the last epidural didn’t work at all, in fact it made things worse.  Next doctor appointment is Monday and then I believe it’s time to meet a surgeon or two for an opinion(s) (yikes). But don’t worry, since standing is one position that doesn’t hurt much I’ll still be coming up with sweet treats :)

Thanks for looking!