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 ;)

ECU vs. ODU... a family rivalry that is meeting head to head in a tasty tailgating party to throw down.

ECU themed wedding treats

Birthdays and Bow ties

So I got a request for another "little man" birthday party but this one was a little different. The mom loved the bow tie idea but wanted something that would match her invitations a little bit more. We talked about it for a little while and decided to do a simplified version of her invite. I kept the stripes hand-painted to keep that homemade feel and did some smaller name cookies to go along with them (so the kids had one to share with the parents). I wasn't quite sure how these were going to come out but they worked out quite well once everything was together.

Bright colored ice cream cones

These were done for a splash pad party, they were put into cute little boxes that had brightly colored patterns on them.

Beach Party Birthday

I got a call from a friend, who also does cookies, asking for help. She was planning her daughter's birthday party, and didn't have time to make her own cookies... What could I do but say, YES! She had these really cute invites that she was trying to match that had flip-flops and this great beach ball on it. I thought for a long time how to avoid having to do two separate cookies for the flip-flops and then it hit me... a heart! I'm sure someone else has thought of it before, but I've never seen it so I was new to me. The colors worked out great, nice and bright. They all got bagged up with little flip-flop bags and flip-flop keychains tied to them with different colored ribbon, it was a very cute presentation that she had figured out. I had a blast making these and I'm really glad I was able to help out a friend.

Happy Mother's Day, Part 2

 

Happy Mother's Day to all those moms out there. These are the second set of cookies I did for Mother's Day this year, this time I was told the mom loved flowers and her favorite color was yellow.  I knew they were going to be shipped so I didn't want to go too crazy, but thanks to a wonderful flower tutorial from Sweet Sugar Bell (here), I had the perfect idea for my "yellow" flowers, the rest just had to keep up. Instead of using luster dust like she did, I did some washes with color to add depth and definition. I was told she very much enjoyed them, something fun and simple for the Mom who loves bright colors and flowers :)

Warner Brothers... meet Disney.

My newest order was for an old college friend that contacted me for a quick last minute favor. Her mom is celebrating her 60th birthday on Thursday and the family is having a surprise party for her in Kentucky. As if the party wasn't enough, they are also surprising her with a trip to Orlando so she can visit the new Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios and visit Disney World... thus the Mickey meets Harry cookies :) I wanted to try and tie them all together so I carried the same colors thru most of the cookies. I love the way Harry came out. Harry and the Mickey with the buttons are the only un-altered cookies... all the other ones were custom made. The cupcakes came out super cute and my husband decided to help me and picked out yellow and red sprinkles out of my rainbow bottle for me, very patient and very awesome of him.

I'm ready for fall

The weather here has been a tad on the warm side lately and it makes me long for fall. I wanted to add something personal to the FSU cookies I was sending my sister-in-law and one of her favorite things are sunflowers. These started as simple flowers and as I was using a small chocolate cookies as a guide for my center circle, I decided to just drop it down and see what happend. These ended up being double layered using chocolate royal icing as glue and just a few little dots to set off the center. I could see making a whole tray of these in a few months... I may even try doing this in the cookie dough stage by cutting a hole in the bottom cookie and putting the chocolate cookie dough in the hole before it bakes so they are flush. In my head it sounds cool, we'll see what happens :)

Here you can see both cookies stacked using the icing as glue. I had to stack them first and then decorate so I didn't ice over my flower petals.

A new baby about to join the world

My friend is expecting his first kiddo. He is totally playing the proud papa role right now sending out pictures of the ultrasound and posting video of the heartbeat to his facebook. He and his wife are such good and deserving people and we are all very excited for them.

Since I work with the future dad, he has had a chance to sample many of my "boo-boo" cookies that I bring into work (so they don't all go to my waist). His wife has been supper supportive and encouraging but had not had a chance to sample anything yet. I wanted to make them something special that was just for them. Since they are not very far along they do not know any gender information yet but knowing mom and dad I put together something that is pretty gender neutral and not too "baby" in color. I really like the color palette for these, I think they all worked really well. I love the stars and want to make a million more just to see how many faces I can come up with. We had a chance to deliver them tonight and they were very well received. All my love goes out to Brian and Barbara, so far it hasn't been the easiest first couple weeks but she's almost over the first hurdle and ready to enjoy being pregnant.

See more pics here.

Get Russ to Kenya

So we have a friend that is working with CTC International (a world community outreach that enables less fortunate areas of our world experience something better) to teach art skills at a local orphanage and help them find ways to create income using their creativity. He's going to be filming a documentary while he's there and I am so excited for him that he is going to get this opportunity to go and help. Since I don't have the cash to donate, I told him I would make him cookies and he could try and sell them at work... any money he gets goes toward his trip. I found this flag cookie cutter and wanted to do something that related to where he was going instead of something just fun. I hope everyone likes them and they can bring him a few dollars to help out. If you are feeling generous and want to donate, or if you just want to learn more about the program, here is a link to the CTC and Russ's team.

More cookie pictures here.

Update: He got enough money :) After much work and wonderful friends, Russ raised the money he needed for his trip and is all set to go sometime in the next few weeks. Thanks to everyone who supported his cause and congrats to Russ, have a blast and do some good for a change ;)

Boys Night Out

Karl rarely gets to hang out with the guys so when his friend decided to have a poker night, Karl wanted to bring something fun... poker chip shaped cookies (and a few chocolate chip for good measure).

I wasn't quite sure how I was going to pull these off, but after a few (dozen) "boo-boo" cookies, we ended up with these. The guys seemed to really like them since none of them made their way back home, thank goodness for boo-boo cookies... without them I'd never get to try anything :)