Like so many others, I’m smitten with the golden and crimson hues of autumn leaves. But they shouldn’t get all the love. On close inspection, the leaves of each season have their own unique beauty...
It’s the end of November, which means that it's time to share a Christmas tree-themed tutorial! [EDITOR'S NOTE: Apologies to Manu for my delayed posting - it's now early December! However, there's still plenty of time to enjoy this tutorial, and even make this fabulous project! ~ JMU] To kick off, I am posting pictures of the Christmas cookie tutorials that I have shared over the past several years here on Cookie Connection...
The holidays are right around the corner, and I’m feeling mixed emotions. On the one hand, I have all of the joyful anticipation of family gatherings and delicious food. On the other hand, there’s the shopping. In real life, I haven’t even started. But in my cookie fantasies, everyone wants a...
When I was younger, my sister and I used to scramble to grab the newspaper to read our horoscopes. I’m a Virgo. My horoscope was always predictably mundane - “Today you will clean the house . . .” or something equally boring. The symbol for my zodiac sign is a...
This is the story of a cookie tutorial that was meant to be a 3-D pumpkin cookie project but ended up becoming a dimensional cookie composition that resembles a pumpkin. Three years ago I shared a tutorial featuring royal icing place cards. They were royal icing plaque transfers decorated with three different kinds of...
When my kids were little, every Halloween we would make ghost decorations from cheesecloth and laundry starch. The process was simple: soak cheesecloth in the starchy liquid, drape it over a rough form of compacted aluminum foil, and allow it to dry. The gauzy cheesecloth would harden, creating spooky, semi-transparent specters. In this project, naturally-starchy rice paper stands in for cheesecloth to make an edible version of this Halloween craft.
I love flowers of all kinds, but I have a special fondness for flowers that look a little unique. The coneflower, with its spiky, vibrantly colored seed cone and skirt of purple petals, definitely fits the bill. Apparently, bees are just as partial to them as I am, so...
These lavender cookies were inspired, in their entirety, by a video I shot last year while mesmerized by a butterfly moving from sprig to sprig on a lavender bush. When I replayed the video...
I wasn’t trying to pick favorites when I made a cookie inspired by one of my dogs. But ever since, my daughter has been campaigning for our cat to get a cookie of his own. I’m not surprised; they have always had a special bond. We’ve had our cat since my daughter was little, and they’ve been an inseparable pair. While the décor in her room...
Over the last two months, the hills around our house have transitioned from a lively green to a sad brown to a lovely gold. Summer has definitely arrived. When my children were younger, this time of year we would always visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium. The aquarium never...
As a kid, I loved to pick flowers and press them between the pages of books. It's these fond memories of pressed flowers that inspired me to recreate them in royal icing...
With Father’s Day coming soon, I’ve been thinking a lot about my dad. He was the kind of person who made every moment feel like an experience. Every errand was an opportunity to get lost and discover something magical. Every day was a chance to...
My mother recently installed some lattices on her terrace and, with that image in mind, I immediately envisioned a Mother’s Day cookie project: a lattice cookie decorated with royal icing flower transfers. The transfers for this project are a...
Meet my muse for this cookie: my Great Dane, Atlas. Atlas is a giant goofball, literally and figuratively. He jumps like he’s on a pogo stick, he flings slobber to unfathomable heights, and he sleeps folded in half like a pocketknife.
Even after I finished the cutwork lace cookies showcased in my previous tutorial, that embroidery technique kept developing in my mind. In fact, it developed to the point of this project...
