Preparing Royal Icing

My goal for this post is for you to learn something new you didn't know about royal icing, and to show you that with a little practice (and patience), you can make some cute cookies!

First of all you need to have 4 ingredients on hand; powdered sugar, meringue powder, any flavor oil free extract, and water. Pretty simple! For those of you that are unfamiliar with meringue powder, you can find it at Hobby Lobby, Joann's, or even Wal Mart. Look for it in the baking section. (pic below)

I always make my icing in my standard size Kitchen Aid mixer. I don't recommend using a mixer with a bigger bowl because I have found it doesn't seem to mix as well.

Now to make your icing!!!

Empty one bag of powdered sugar into your mixing bowl. Put 6 TBS of meringue powder in the bowl with your powder sugar and using your whisk attachment blend the sugar and powder. While you are blending your sugar and powder, grab a cup and mix 3/4 cup water with 1 TBS of any flavor extract. Slowly add the water mixture to your mixing bowl (with your mixer running) until you don't see any dry powder. When the powder is absorbed, turn your mixer speed to med-high, and set your timer for 4 minutes. After the four minutes is up, run a spatula around the sides of the bowl to incorporate any unmixed powder. Check the texture of your icing, it should form stiff peaks when your spatula is pulled away. You may need to mix your icing longer, I set my timer for 1 minute increments and check it until it is ready.

As soon as your icing is ready, transfer it to an airtight bowl. Make sure it is airtight. Air makes royal icing harden quickly.

IMPORTANT: Make sure your mixing bowl, and everything else you use to make the icing is clean and oil free. Oil and royal icing are not friends.

Royal Icing is good for a month if it is stored air tight in the refrigerator. I personally don't like to keep it longer than a week. Everyone has different preferences and you will find your own the more you make it and see what works for you!

Now you are ready to make your piping and filling icings. This recipe should ice around 4 dozen cookies. I double this recipe and it usually lasts me around 8 dozen cookies.

I'm excited to hear your feedback! If you use this and learn something new, let me know! If there is something I didn't cover that you have questions about feel free to ask. I will cover mixing and preparing piping and fillier icing next. Too much to cover in one post!

Happy Icing Making! :)

Lilly Pulitzer & A Party

I am playing catch up posting all of the cookies I have done, and I am so excited to share these with you!

I did four different Lilly Pulitzer patterns for a wedding shower a couple of weekends ago.

These are definitely some of my favorite. I used a bunch of different techniques for all of the different patterns.

*Decorators: I iced my cookies with the four different background colors and let them dry overnight before I put a pattern on them. This gives you a hard surface to work with, and it keeps your colors from bleeding when you apply your designs.

I added an initial to the cookies to finish them off and I just loved the way they turned out. Sadly I didn't get a pic :(.

I thought these would be the perfect cookies to lead into my "How To" icing post. I am finishing up tonight and I will have it up tomorrow.

On a family note, we celebrated my twin nieces 8th birthday last week and I thought I would share a few fun pics.

The kid table. I'm pretty sure Taylor was on cloud nine sitting with the big kids. And yes, Regan and Riley are twins but could not be more different. Regan is taller, has blue eyes, and is built like my Mom and I. Riley has brown eyes, is shorter, and more petite. So fun!

Me and T. Right before we were walking out the door Taylor covered herself in Gillette body wash so after a quick outfit changed I realized we were twinkies!

Every time I look at this picture I die laughing. Look at Parker?!

And lastly, T disappeared and came back with one of the girls new shoes on. She was so proud she had gone and done this by herself!

Happy 8th Birthday Regan and Riley!



Peyton's Birthday

"My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."

Psalm73:26

"Weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning."

Psalm 30:5

"The Lord is close to the broken hearted, and saves those who are crushed in Spirit."

Psalm 34:18

"The Lord is good, a refuge in time of trouble. He cares for those who trust Him."

Nahum 1:7

"The Lord is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold."

Psalm 18:2

"Cast your cares on the Lord and He will sustain you; He will never let the righteous fall."

Psalm 55:22

"Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted."

Matthew 5:4

"He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."

Revelation 21:4

We had a wonderful day yesterday celebrating our sweet Peyton's 5th birthday in Heaven. We are so thankful for all of the texts, messages, calls and cards we received.

Vintage Cowboy

Thank you for all of the emails and messages about my tutorial post, my next tutorial will be on "How to Prepare Royal Icing." I hope to have that up at the end this week!


Speaking of tutorial post, I haven't shown you the rest of the cookies that went with the bandana print 4's. These were for a vintage cowboy themed party.

Aren't these so fun?!

Cowboy Boots

Horseshoes

Cowboy Hats

and of course the paisley #4's.:)

Up next, Lilly Pulitzer cookies!!!

Paisley Pattern Tutorial

I think I am going to start doing some Tutorial and "How To" posts, so if you enjoy this one let me know and I will do more! I get a lot of emails from other cookie decorators about how I do certain things, and if you have something specific you would like me to do a tutorial on I would love to do it.

I think one of my very favorite patterns to do on a cookie is the Paisley pattern. Typically when I use this pattern it is in a bandana print, but there are a million other ways to use Paisleys.

I loved these sweet Paisley cookies I did for a birthday party this past March. The possibilities are endless!

Now for the Tutorial:

1. Bake your cookies and make your icing. Make a piping consistency icing, and a filler consistency icing in whatever color you choose as your base. You also need black and white piping consistency icing.

2. Begin with a plain cookie, any size or shape. I am using a #4 shaped cookie.

2. Outline your cookie with the piping icing you chose as your base color.

3. Now fill  your cookie with the filler icing. Let the cookie dry for at least 3 or 4 hours, but preferably overnight. A cookie is much easier to work with after its dried overnight.

(This pic was right after the cookie was filled. It won't be so shiny after its all dry)

Time for the fun part!!!

4.Using your black piping icing, place a few "raindrop" shaped paisleys sporadically on the cookies.

The shape and size don't really matter.

5. Next Using your white piping icing, line the inner lines of the black paisleys.

6. Using your black piping icing, line the white paisley with black dots.

7.Using your white piping icing, make a ruffle pattern around your original black paisley. It is best to make sure your black icing has dried enough to not bleed into your white icing.

8. Time to fill the open spots. To stick with the bandana look, use designs like these:

.........and these....

.......until you end up with these:

Aren't these the cutest?! You could use any color for the base, think about how cute a blue or yellow would be!

If you don't want the bandana look, put more (or bigger) paisleys on your cookie, and fill the open spots with polka dots and circles.

I hope you have enjoyed my first tutorial, I love sharing the process!



This and That

We are finally back into the swing of things after taking a weekend away with family. Getting away was much needed, and we had an absolute blast. The kids were so easy and slept like champs the two nights we were away.

Miss priss had a blast. I'm pretty sure she ate an awful amount of sweets and basically was given what she wanted when she wanted it. That's what getting away is for, right?

And this sweet boy was in heaven with his big cousins. He is majorly outnumbered being the only boy grandchild, but he doesn't seem to mind a bit!

We got home Sunday afternoon, and after naps we headed out to the North campus of our church for the Annual Fireworks at the Crosses. We love going to this every year, it is amazing!

Not the best pic but the only one I got with me and the kids.

As if sno cones, fireworks and running around like crazy wasn't fun enough, look who we ran into?!

Regan and Riley!!!!

We sat with my oldest sis, her hubby, and their twin girls and had so much fun. Taylor was entertaining us all by dancing around and doing somersaults. She wasn't phased a bit by the fireworks.

This was a perfect way to enjoy some fireworks since we aren't able to shoot any on the 4th. Not to mention we didn't have to buy them or clean them up! :)

Before we left I delivered two cookie orders to finish up my week. The first order was for Brittany. I met Brittany through twitter and she is so sweet! The cookies were for her sisters bridal shower which was tea party themed.

I love this theme and I love these colors!

There are cutters that I absolutely can't wait to use and the spoon is one of them. How fun is this?! I also use my Wilton metallic spray whenever I can so that just makes it double the fun.

A couple of close ups....

Lastly I made Peanut Butter Smores from Pinterest last night and they were SO GOOD. If you or someone in your family likes Peanut Butter you have to give these a try!

Head on over to The Sweet Life for the recipe!

I Do and Cat In the Hat

We have had a couple of crazy weeks around our house, and a couple of fun cookie orders to add to the craziness!!!

My first order was for an engagement party. Kelly sent me to Pinterest after finding a cookie that the bride loved. I took that idea and put my own spin on it and loved how they turned out.

I added small pearls to the flowers in the girls hair, painted metallic gold on the ring, and used sanding sugar on the "diamond."

Congrats Elizabeth and Bradley!!!

I started this week of with a fun Cat In the Hat order. Jennifer was so easy to work with and I took her ideas and mine and came up with some fun cookies!

I did the hat, some #1's, the Cat In the Hat, and the red fish in his fish bowl.

This was my first time to do the actual Cat in the Hat. I drew him with edible markers onto a white cookie. I thought this would be the best way to get all of the small details.

(this pic is not the best)

The red fish in his fish bowl.

Dr. Seuss never gets old :).

I hope everyone is having a great week!