Lavender Cookies

These lavender cookies are a design that I make over and over again because they come together quickly and although the design is simple, it's a standout.

To make them, you need just three colors of royal icing and absolutely no artistic ability. If you can pipe a line and a dot, you can make these. You also don't need a special cookie cutter...round, square, rectangle, any shape will do.  I used a plaque shaped cutter for these.

These lavender cookies are for my sweet friends at The Wednesday Community Meal. I miss them so much.

Basecoat some cookies with white royal icing and let them dry completely before moving onto the next step. 

With piping consistency green royal icing, pipe some stems and add a few "v's" to them. 

Using lavender piping consistency icing, pipe groups of dots above each of the "v's."

For a final touch,  pipe a few green lines at the base of the stems. 

Whale Cookies

I created these whale cookies for a dear friend's baby shower.

When I first started planning and sketching out the design, I went a little too crazy with the details — adding a pectoral fin, blowhole and eyelashes. I wasn't pleased and decided to pull back and simplify, which I find in most cases, is always best.

The cleaner design made the whales look sweeter, cuter and just what I wanted for a baby shower.

Taking the time to sketch your designs first really pays off. It's much better to test your designs on paper instead of on a cookie!

Here's how I made them:

Bake some whale cookies.

Use an edible ink marker to trace an outline for the belly of the whale. To keep it consistent on all of the cookies,  you may want to make a paper template that you can trace.

Mix up some flood consistency blue icing, white icing and a small amount of black icing. This is wet-on-wet decorating so you need to have all your icings mixed before you start.

Outline and fill in the belly of the whale using a pastry bag fitted with a #2 tip.

With a #2 tip, outline the rest of the whale in blue.

Fill it in with the blue icing and use a scribe tool or skewer to help evenly distribute it.

Drop on a dot of black for the eye.

Add a drop of white icing inside the black.

Let the whales dry for at least 30 minutes before proceeding to the next step.

Add some lines of white icing to the belly.

Add some lines of blue icing to the tail.

All done! Let the cookies dry completely before serving or packaging.

Dipped Marbleized Cookies

I really wish I could, but I can't take credit for the clever marbleizing technique I used to create these colorful cookies.

The genius behind it is decorator Meghan Rosko who generously shared it on her YouTube channel. She also has a website called Nutmeg and Honeybee.

Besides the look of these cookies, I love how quick it was to decorate them. In just 10 minutes, I had two dozen cookies done and I didn't have to use a single pastry bag!

The cookies are decorated by dipping them into thinned royal icing that has food coloring painted on the surface. These were so much fun and I can't wait to experiment some more.

To decorate cookies, first soak some paint brushes in water. Then thin to flood consistency in a bowl some white royal icing and squeeze out your gel colors of choice onto a plate. I used moss green, cornflower blue, teal, ivory and rose.

Add strokes of the color to the top of your royal icing. Be sure to dip your brush in water to clean it off between colors.

Dip the cookies one at a time into the icing, holding your fingers back and just coating the top. Swirl and shake the excess icing off, still holding the cookie upside down. Place the cookie icing side up on a sheetpan to dry. Repeat, adding more gel coloring to the icing as needed. I found that I could get three cookies dipped before needing to add more color. Let the cookies dry completely before serving.

Rose Valentine Cookies

Each time I decorate cookies, my skills improve and  I get faster and more consistent.

Yes, it's no secret that good old fashioned practice is the way to upgrade your cookie decorating and these wet on wet rose Valentine cookies prove that point. The technique isn't hard, you just pipe a blob of wet icing onto wet icing and swirl it around with a toothpick or scribe tool. But, it does take some experience and finessing to make a rose that looks sort of realistic.

What I really love is that after lots of practice, I'm not only better at making wet on wet roses but I'm faster, which is why I even considered adding them to cookies for my upcoming fundraising sale.

Here's a sneak peak:

These mini rose cookies will be for sale in sets of two.

The mini rose cookies also look cute when stuck on top of a larger base cookie.

I used ivory, pink and a bit of moss green icing for these.

Here's a closeup of some mini roses. I used the same icing for the leaves to add groups of tiny dots.

Wet On Wet Flowers

I've shown how to make these before but I so love cookie decorating that's easier than it looks and these wet on wet flowers are just that.

They are called wet on wet flowers because they are created by adding wet icing onto wet icing and then using a scribe tool to swirl and blend to create the flowers.

It truly is easy and a little bit of practice makes perfect. The only rules are that you must have all of your icing colors mixed and ready to go at once before you start decorating and you can only work on one cookie at a time.

Here's how:

Get all your icing colors mixed and ready. You want them all to be flood consistency.

I outlined and flooded a cookie with green icing and then immediately added a blob of light pink, the size I wanted the flower to be. On top of the light pink, I then added some dark pink and white.

I used my scribe tool (a skewer or toothpick would also work) to swirl the colors together to create a flower shape.

Then I dropped on a bit of dark yellow for the center.

I highlighted the center by adding some dark pink under it.

And, added some more drops of light pink to create another layer of petals.

Maneuver the icing with your scribe tool until you are satisfied.

I'm pleased with this!

Add some green icing for leaves.

Use your scribe tool to pull the green icing out to a point. Before I did this, I dipped my scribe tool in a bit of the lighter green to create little lines.

I also decided to add a few white dots all around the cookie.

Here's another one. I outlined and flooded the cookie, added the same icings for the flower and added a dark pink border.

I didn't add a center to this flower, I just swirled the colors together. For interest, I added a little line of yellow to the center of the leaves by dipping my scribe tool in the icing and lightly drawing it on.

Here's a variation with lots of small flowers and a bead border. I didn't add any white to the flowers, I just used light and dark pink.

And here's yet another design. There really is no end to what you can create.

Gingerbread Wreath Cookies

I have to credit my #65 Wilton leaf tip for these cute and realistic looking gingerbread wreath cookies. Making them isn't hard at all, it just takes some time. The real trick is just piping the leaves in random directions, making their placement look as natural as possible.

These make great Christmas tree ornaments and can be enjoyed year after year if you carefully box them up after the holidays. Keep them wrapped in tissue paper and nice and dry.

Here's how to make them:

Bake some round gingerbread cookies and be sure to make a hole in the dough before baking if you want to turn them into ornaments.

Outline a wreath shape with white icing.

Immediately fill it in and use a skewer or scribe tool to help evenly distribute the icing.

Give the cookie a gentle shake to help the icing settle and set it aside to dry completely before moving onto the next step.

When the cookie is dry mix up some stiff green icing and place it in a pastry bag fitted with a small leaf tip. I used a Wilton #65. Start piping leaves, working your way around and trying to make their placement as natural as possible.

One done, more to go!

Once the leaves have dried for at least 15 minutes, you can pipe on some small red berries using medium consistency red icing and a #1 tip. Let the cookie dry completely before threading twine or a small ribbon through the hole.

Once I got going with my leaf piping,  I found it hard to stop!

Cookie closeup.