At the end of last week's Spotlight, contributor @LisaF mentioned feeling a heightened sense of urgency to get cracking on Halloween cookies after seeing the plethora of pumpkins in her local markets. At the time, I was feeling pretty chill about my Halloween decorating so her sentiment didn't really resonate. (After all, I thought, I was on the verge of releasing a new tombstone stencil-and-cutter kit, so I was actually ahead of the eight ball for once.) But, oh, how quickly things can change! Not long after that Spotlight (yesterday, actually), I ventured to several garden centers to find evergreens for my upcoming Christmas video shoot (which, BTW, is no small task in September), and instead I saw this . . .
Wowza! That's when anxiety kicked in! I've been so busy with Halloween and Christmas cookie decorating that I haven't stopped to groom my now tired summer window boxes and various other planters, much less stopped to smell their dwindling flowers. I was itching to snatch up a whole cartload of these beauties and get re-planting, but when? How could I possibly jam one more thing on my to-do list? Reluctantly, I let practicality get the better of me, and I returned home empty-handed and a little bit sad that my fall garden wouldn't be as fall-ish as it could be this year.
Fortunately, my gloomy mood lifted as quickly as it had descended - just as soon as I got into writing this Spotlight, in fact! Seeing so many beautiful fall and Halloween cookies on Cookie Connection was just the boost I needed. Maybe my garden will be a bit drab this season, but my larger world view remains colorful and bright, thanks to you and your wonderful contributions!
So, with my little flower tale behind us, let's now turn to seeing which of the week's contributions hit our hot list*!
#1: Carousel by cookiebouquets [EDITOR'S NOTE: Special congrats to @cookiebouquets. This cookie creation has now appeared in two Spotlights! ~JMU]
#2: Blooming Orchid by Icingsugarkeks [EDITOR'S NOTE: Re-read what I just said about #1 because the same holds true for this post. These lovely orchid cookies have now hit our hot list for the second week in a row. Excellent job, @Icingsugarkeks! ~JMU]
#3: Trick or Treat! by Tina at Sugar Wishes [EDITOR'S NOTE: This witch is literally leaping off her cookie due to Tina's attention to perspective and texture. I especially appreciate Tina's clever use of glass noodles and royal icing for the hair. ~JMU]
#4: Sweethearts Cookie Set by EAC [EDITOR'S NOTE: I always love seeing others' takes on my stencils, but @EAC made me especially proud with this collection that she airbrushed and stenciled with my Sweethearts Dynamic Duos™ sets. Her work is extraordinarily clean. There's no evident underspray around those black silhouettes, which is very, very hard to achieve! ~JMU]
#5: Dinosaur Cookies by Gloriabakes [EDITOR'S NOTE: I am 100-percent positive that Liam couldn't resist his dino-themed birthday set! What a treat! 
~JMU]
#6: Halloween by KUMIKO KISHI [EDITOR'S NOTE: Who knew Halloween could be so cute?! ~JMU]
#7: Halloween Squares by Gingerland [EDITOR'S NOTE: This image earned this week's cover spot because of how well it marries simplicity with complexity. Though many interesting patterns are at play, the overall presentation remains crisp and uncluttered due Gingerland's finesse with her airbrush and her choice of a monochrome palette. Congrats, @Gingerland! ~JMU]
#8: 3-D Halloween Graveyard Vignette by Julia M. Usher [EDITOR'S NOTE: Hey, that's me! Remember, I simply post the ten top-trending cookies based on what the site's algorithms* tell me. No photo on this list, other than the cover image, is handpicked by any human. BTW, these cookies were made with my new tombstone kit that I referred to earlier. ~JMU]
#9: Hello, Autumn! by The Vintage Cookie Jar [EDITOR'S NOTE: What a sweetie! I need to adopt more of her zen-like quality when it comes to my fall gardening! LOL! ~JMU]
#10: Bride Luxury Box by cookiebouquets [EDITOR'S NOTE: Another repeat honoree from last week, and also @cookiebouquets' second mention this week. Kudos to you, cookiebouquets! ~JMU]
So that no one has an unfair advantage in making it onto a hot list, the algorithm is secret even to site administrators. Only our platform developers know the code, which has been exhaustively tested by those developers and Cookie Connection staff.
All photos shown here are the courtesy (and copyright) of the designers listed.
To check out our other hot lists, at any time of day, visit our Hot Spot, also found in the site's main navigation line.
Note: Saturday Spotlight is a weekly Cookie Connection blog feature written alternately by Lisa Foss and Julia M. Usher. Its primary intent is to cast a spotlight on the week's top-trending cookie posts, as determined automatically by the site algorithms described above. This article expresses the views of the author, and not necessarily those of this site, its owners, its administrators, or its employees. To see all of Cookie Connection's past Saturday Spotlights, click here.
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