Giving Thanks for Thanksgiving

I had two different orders for Thanksgiving this year. One was for a school and she wanted something fun and age appropriate for elementary aged kids. The second was for a repeat customer who always has a big family gathering and everyone bakes but her, so she wanted to bring something extra fun this year to show off... here's what I came up with. I kinda wish I had more to do because these were so much fun to design and make.

Don't these remind you of school? They were inspired by the stack I get of them every year from my son... I love them!

Thanksgiving set number two, not the best pic but I love them Gobble, Gobble! Happy Thanksgiving y'all

Harvest Candy Corn... yes, they do taste different!

They all taste the same... right? It's funny because there is a discussion every year around this time in our house over this "harvest mix" of sweet goodness. We know they are all the exact same ingredients but somehow our brain has us convinced that some taste better than others... I'm tricking my sister's brain and sending her come cookies to taste test this year ;)

Johnson Park in Marble Falls... Halloween charity sale

I had the wonderful opportunity to work with a group called Ride-On which does therapeutic horse training with vets with a group called A Place of Hope who give free medical care to vets who do not have insurance or can't afford treatment. I had so much fun working on these designs and actually doing Halloween cookies for change. If you're in the area (Marble Falls) and want to stop buy, come on down and take a look.

Pink Pumpkins and Pearls... Happy Birthday

I got the cutest request for birthday cookies the other day. The theme? Pink Pumpkins and Pearls, the girlier the better. The mom wanted a characterize version of her daughter's face and some fun pink pumpkins to go along with them. I had so much fun with these, my hands were pink for a week but I totally didn't care.

This is halloween, this is halloween...

Boys and girls of every age

Wouldn't you like to see something strange?

Come with us and you will see

This, our town of Halloween

This is Halloween, this is Halloween

Pumpkins scream in the dead of night

This is Halloween, everybody make a scene

Trick or treat till the neighbors gonna die of fright

It's our town, everybody scream

In this town of Halloween

I am the one hiding under your bed

Teeth ground sharp and eyes glowing red

I am the one hiding under yours stairs

Fingers like snakes and spiders in my hair

This is Halloween, this is Halloween

Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!

In this town we call home

Everyone hail to the pumpkin song

In this town, don't we love it now?

Everybody's waiting for the next surprise

Round that corner, man hiding in the trash can

Something's waiting now to pounce, and how you'll...

Scream! This is Halloween

Red 'n' black, slimy green

Aren't you scared?

Well, that's just fine

Say it once, say it twice

Take a chance and roll the dice

Ride with the moon in the dead of night

Everybody scream, everbody scream

In our town of Halloween!

I am the clown with the tear-away face

Here in a flash and gone without a trace

I am the "who" when you call, "Who's there?"

I am the wind blowing through your hair

I am the shadow on the moon at night

Filling your dreams to the brim with fright

This is Halloween, this is Halloween

Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!

Halloween! Halloween! 

Tender lumplings everywhere

Life's no fun without a good scare

That's our job, but we're not mean

In our town of Halloween

In this town

Don't we love it now?

Everybody's waiting for the next surprise 

Skeleton Jack might catch you in the back

And scream like a banshee

Make you jump out of your skin

This is Halloween, everyone scream

Wont' ya please make way for a very special guy

Our man jack is King of the Pumpkin patch

Everyone hail to the Pumpkin King now!

This is Halloween, this is Halloween

Halloween! Halloween! Halloween! Halloween!

In this town we call home

Everyone hail to the pumpkin song

La la la la-la la [Repeat]

These need no further introduction, Happy Birthday Wes... hope you like them.

(more pics here)

A plate of party cookies...

This is the result of friends "helping" me make cookies. They are not exactly how I normally do them, but it was our annual Halloween party with all our friends and they weren't going to judge them by anything but taste... so I let them help, and it was actually quite fun and a little free-ing. I didn't get very many pics, but it is one pretty fun looking plate of cookies.

See if you can find all our spooky friends: witches, vampires, frankenstein (he's a little hidden) and his wife, black bats, purple bats, witch brooms and cauldrons, gravestones, eerie eyes, spider webs, ghosts, jack-o-lanterns, coffins, and various random halloween bites.

Wedding favor ideas for a fall wedding

I've been working on my photo taking, what do you think? So my sister-in-law has a friend that is getting married in November. Her save the date cards were of the couple sitting in a movie theater watching a movie with the caption, "the best show is yet to come." Although she asked for fall leaves because of the season of the wedding, we thought we'd give them an alternate option that reflected their fun personalities and relate to their early announcements. So the above is option #1 for them to consider. The image below is closer to what they asked for, something clean and slightly modern that represents fall. I posted pictures of the fall leaves that I did for the Austin Bakes for Bastrop sale... this is why those were included for the bake sale. I really wanted to do a sample of these to send and to try out the new recipe for Brown Sugar Spice with Maple icing. The feedback from the sale was great so I feel like this could be an awesome addition to my fall line-up of flavors. This is also a preview of my new labels :)

Austin Bakes for Bastrop... the final tallys

I was absolutely humbled today by the amount of love that was baked into sugary treats this weekend to help the victims of the Bastrop wildfires. The event had set a goal of $10,000... that's a lot of money for bake sale but we were determined to reach it. At last count we were at $12,561.79!! Wow is all I can say. I started looking around at the fellow bakers from my sale and then going online to see what everyone else brought to the party. All I can say is it's a good thing we spread out or I would of bought one of everything I saw :) My final tally at the end of 4 very long days were: 18 Texas Flags, 12 Double layer Sunflowers, approximately 36 fall leaves, 6 pumpkins, 6 acorns, 18 red, white, & blue star "bites," and 36 texas "bites" with hearts. I am trying not to fall asleep as I type this because I really wanted to get a post in today. So much work but soooo worth every minute. I met a lot of very nice people today and got to try a new recipe, Brown Sugar Spice with Maple frosting, and they were delicious!

(Sorry about the pictures, it was really early in the morning so I had zero light to work with other than my flash and an incandescent overhead light)