Cookie Love

The best thing about a special day like Valentine's Day is that  I get to experiment with new cookies designs that I've never tried before. I finally got to put my frog shaped cookie cutter to use. I made Froggy Love Valentine's cookies.

Froggy went a courtin'......

I made a double batch of  sugar cookie dough because I had a few cookie ideas I wanted to try out. These Froggy Love cookies were so easy to make. 

Bake a batch of your favorite frog shaped cookies, click here for my favorite sugar cookie recipe. Also make a batch of royal icing, found here.  I coloured some royal icing kelly green, yellow and black. With flood (corn syrup consistency) green royal icing, outline the frog shape cookie then fill in right away. Use yellow flood icing to make belly and spots. Let the icing dry for about 1 hour, then pipe thinned white royal icing for the eyeball. Let cookie dry up to 8 hours or overnight. 

There are a lot of great blog sites out there with tutorials and tips on how to decorate with royal icing. I have my own techniques which work for me but one site that is really great for royal icing tips is Sweetopia. I use the same technique she does. She outlines and flood with the same consistence icing and I think this gives a even, thick, coating. Other's use a thicker consistency on the outline and then flood inside with thinner icing. I don't like the outlined ridge that it makes :( 

Actually if I'm in a rush I skip the outline and just use a thin spreader and cover the cookie with icing by spreading the icing to edges. Consistency is very important if you do it this way because there is no outline to stop the icing from running over the edges if the icing is to thin. I usually resort to this when I'm doing a solid colour on a basic shaped cookie, a large amount of the same design or covering the icing with a decorative design. 

I did these 3-D Teddy Bears without outlining first and you can see that the edges aren't very even :( It does works but it takes a lot of practice and patience. I'm still learning myself all the time, that's the best part because it never gets boring :) My best advice is practice, practice and practice. Do what is most comfortable for you and if you mess up, well do what I do. Feed those to the family, they never complain....if they know what's good for them. (lol) 

Anyways back to the froggy's.....once the icing is completely dry, dust cheeks with pink shimmer powder. Draw a mouth on with edible black marker. I added little heart sprinkle for lips. Then with Wilton tip 2 make frog leg markings and arms with leftover  green royal icing. Also add black royal icing for eye centers. Let the icing dry completely.

The result is some very cute froggy cookies!

I also had a hugs and kisses cookie cutter I wanted to try out.....

And..... remember all those rolled fondant roses I made? Well I decide to use some of them on heart shaped cookies. I flooded my heart shape cookies with pink coloured royal icing, let them dry for an hour or two, then added a lace design with white icing. Once the cookies were dry I filled the centers with fondant rolled ribbon roses and leaves. If you want to try making some ribbon roses click here for a simple tutorial. 

 I also flooded some simple flower shape cookies with pink icing and added a lace design. I saw this lace design on The Sweet Adventures of Sugarbelle and  I'm so glad I tried it. It's a great way to make a simple cookie look fabulous.  Check out her blogsite, her cookies are stunning.

Making extra ribbon roses is always a good thing, it turn any simple cookie into a beautiful work of art. Next time you have some leftover fondant don't throw it out up-cycle  it into some ribbon roses.

Seeing as I had red ribbon roses......I made some white, black and red cookies too !!

I'm having a hard time deciding which ones are my favorite.

No troubles deciding who to give them to though. 

Happy Cookie Making :)

Thanks for Hopping by!                

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