One day toward the end of July, my daughter looked at me and said, “I can’t wait for Halloween.” I was in complete agreement. Is three months too long to count down? My daughter is...
Around this time last year, I made a treasure chest cookie and declared pirates to be my new favorite theme. This year, I'm sticking with the theme and tapping into pirate lore. What can strike fear in the hearts of the most hardened pirates? What can snap a ship in two like a twig?...
School is finally out. The days are long, and the nights are warm. Let’s go camping...
When I made the unicorn royal icing transfer for this cookie, I didn’t have a firm plan for the background. A fairytale setting seemed fitting, but...
While creating last month’s bamboo tutorial, I stumbled upon the idea of painting wafer paper with royal icing. This month, I was eager to explore the idea a little further...
When I was growing up, our silverware drawer was always filled with a hodgepodge of cutlery patterns. Some were modern and streamlined, others vintage and ornate. I was known to...
It’s almost December, and after so many years of sharing tutorials on Julia M. Usher's Cookie Connection, I declare my November/December 3-D Christmas tree cookie tutorial a tradition. This year's tree...
Oftentimes, working through the process of one cookie project will spur an idea for another. Last month when I was gluing loads of little pieces of wafer paper to my vulture, it inspired another project in which I could...
In 2018, I bought a pack of 100 sheets of wafer paper to make a teeny tiny greeting card for a Mother’s Day cookie. Since then, I’ve used wafer paper in one other project to make a couple of small oak leaves. Between the two projects, I’ve...
I may have mentioned once or twice that Halloween cookies are my favorite. I pretty much wait all year for that one month. But it’s peak summer right now - time for sun and seashells, not ghosts and ghouls. So...
To my surprise, rice paper has become one of my favorite elements to incorporate into new designs. It’s such a versatile material. Rice paper can be molded (to create a balloon), imprinted (with the veining of a bumblebee wing), or kept flat (like the windows of a tiny cabin). It can be...
Judging by online searches and tutorials, the cookie community adores puffy royal icing. I, too, love that soft, pillowy look. But with puffy icing also comes sloped, rounded edges. Sometimes I don’t...
Do you ever get a cookie idea that stubbornly refuses to budge? The idea for this Rapunzel tower cookie popped into my head one day and set up camp. Don’t get me wrong, I liked the concept. It seemed cute but also...
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...
