Julia's October Stencil Release - Winter Wishes and Happy Hanukkah

Admittedly, it feels a little premature to be posting Christmas and Hanukkah cookies when the mercury climbed to 93°F just a few days ago! But, I know how we cookiers are - it's almost never too soon to start planning ahead for the year's biggest cookie holidays. And stencils are never more welcome than at this busy time of year. I mean, who wants to crank out hundreds of handpiped cookies when there is holiday shopping and gift wrapping galore to do - and when stencils can get your cookies in the bag (so to speak) at least ten times as fast!

That all being said, I've got a little pre-holiday gift for you: this month, I'm releasing not one, but two Duos^TM sets - one for Christmas and another for Hanukkah!

• Winter Wishes Dynamic Duos^TM Background Set (upper left),
• Winter Wishes Dynamic Duos^TM Message and Frame Set (combined with the Duos^TM background set; upper right),
• My partner Confection Couture's Holiday Jar Basic Accent Stencil (lower right), and
• My Winter Botanica Prettier Plaques^TM Set (a fave Christmas set from last season; lower left).

Of course, my stencil partner and I have launched several other Christmas, Hanukkah, and winter-themed stencils over the last year or so. You can find all of them here, here, and here.

Now, for the Hanukkah sets, here's what they look like on cookies (as always, there are many more design possibilities; I've shown but a few):

Not to overwhelm you with this month's stencil bounty, but . . . if you're in my Stencil of the Month Club, this month you'll get both my Winter Wishes Dynamic Duos^TM Background Set and Confection Couture's Holiday Jar Basic Accent Stencil - a $22.99 value for only $14.99. As long as you stay a member, you will also get 15% off anything else on the Confection Couture site! In a single snapshot, here's what this month's offering looks like:

If you're not a Club member and want to be - or if you would like to gift a Club membership to a friend for Christmas (what a great idea! ) - simply sign up here!

With all those stencil intros behind us, let's now look in more detail at the Winter Wishes sets, starting first with the background set and its contents.

Winter Wishes Dynamic Duos^TM Background Set (6 pieces)

I gotta say . . . I'm kind of enamored with this set! I love birds, and it's got two of them. Plus, it gives you the flexibility to create designs that range from very simple (with just a single pine branch) to super jazzy (with the full-on snow and pine cone garland background). To see what I mean, take a gander below . . . The first image encapsulates this range, with the center cookie being the most complex. It uses the background as well as two foreground elements (both the cardinal and the simple pine branch). By contrast, I skipped the background element on the other two cookies, and went straight to a bird and pine branch (positioned at different angles).

The picture below provides a closer view of the jazzy cookie. I used AmeriColor Silver Sheen for the snow. And because I wanted a classic red-and-green Christmas-y look, I opted for straight-up AmeriColor Leaf Green for the pine boughs; Chefmaster Harvest Brown for the pine cones; and a combo of Chefmaster Super Red, AmeriColor Super Black, and AmeriColor Lemon Yellow (mixed with brown) for the bird. The same red was used for the berries, and a light free-form spray of Leaf Green was applied to the cookie edges to finish and soften the overall look.

Here's a close-up of my fave - the simple bird-and-boughs cookie with no background. I did deck out the boughs a bit with glittery pixie dust, however - I just couldn't help myself! (After all, more is more! )

Now, let's add some more variety by layering in the complementary message and frame set, which contains messages and frames (natch!) that look like Christmas gift tags!

Winter Wishes Dynamic Duos^TM Message and Frame Set (7 pieces)

Again, you can go all out, as in the heart-shaped cookie below, which contains the snowy background, a bird, an extra pine bough, and a framed message. (Mind you, that cookie is about 4 inches across in order to accommodate all that stuff.) Or, you can go more minimalist with just pine boughs and framed messages, as on the smaller (2- to 3-inch) cookies to the right. In fact, your Christmas sets will look more interesting, in my humble opinion, if you vary cookie complexity across the set.

Zooming in now for a closer look . . .

Of course, you needn't stencil everything straight onto the cookie either! These messages and frames are designed to evoke gift tags, so why not stencil them separately on wafer paper, cut them out, and then "tie" them onto the cookies with chocolate ribbons?! That way, they really get the gift tag-message across (pun intended)!

And, last but not least, my Hanukkah sets! The background set contains so many dreidels and other elements, oh my!

Happy Hanukkah Dynamic Duos^TM Background Set (7 pieces)

Here is just one possible way of layering these elements together, using AmeriColor Silver Sheen (for the menorah background shading), a mixture of AmeriColor Pearl Sheen and Sky Blue for the starry background, and a mixture of AmeriColor Royal Blue and Regal Purple for the darker blue. For extra dimensionality and interest, I airbrushed the dreidels onto rolled fondant, trimmed around them, and then elevated them on top of tiny fondant blobs.

As for the messages and frames, this set has four options for both, which you'll see applied to the cookies below with the same fondant technique used for the dreidels.

Happy Hanukkah Dynamic Duos^TM Message and Frame Set (7 pieces)

Closer still . . .

And so I conclude my October release! May these sets bring you endless holiday designs - and free you up to get all that holiday shopping and wrapping done on time!

• To purchase my Dynamic Duos^TM sets, click here.
• To join my Stencil of the Month Club, click here.
• To see my entire stencil line, including my Prettier Plaques^TM sets, click here.
• To view my videos that show how to create layered looks with my stencil sets, click here.

If you have any technical questions about these stencils, please don't hesitate to email me at sweetlife@juliausher.com or to leave a comment below. Please, however, direct all ordering and Club questions to my stencil partner, Confection Couture Stencils, at service@confectioncouturestencils.com. Thank you!