Posts

cookie graffiti

I kind of like things that are familiar. I have, umm, let's just say, A LOT of shirts in my closet and I probably wear 7 of them. (Can you guess how often I do laundry?) When I go to one of those fancy juice and weird grass blender places I order the same thing. I'm scared that if I order one of the other delicious sounding drinks that it won't be delicious. In college, I ate tortillas every day for nearly 2 months. And then...one day...I just stopped eating them. And I started eating cottage cheese and rice instead. (I just said I was a college student. These food choices should not be surprising to anyone. They required zero cooking and minimal refrigerator space and could easily be labeled with my own name to keep otherwise "innocent" roommates from eating them.)   I usually don't even realize when I've moved on to a new phase until its been weeks or months and someone asks me what I eat and I realize we've eaten the same thing for dinner 3 n

bunny head things

Remember how I advised you against trying to make a bunny head with an egg cutter? I can't stop thinking about those bunnies. Because they were almost what I wanted. But not quite. I decided to try them again using an actual bunny head cutter. No sense trying to re-invent the wheel. Or, at least, that's what someone old once told me. And if they're old, you better listen. At least occasionally. You know, when it works out for you. These certainly have less of a "pushed out a suction tube" look to them than my previous bunnies, but they are missing bowties. Okay, I can see that I am just going to have to show you the picture of my "other" bunnies. Just promise me you won't look too long at them, okay? (And no clicking on the picture so it gets really big while you catalog all the flaws.) I love the bowties on these cuties. I just don't like how the ears look all weirdy. HEY! Stop staring. Seriously, you promised. I think that I either need to

real eggs this time

Wow. I know its been a cookie eternity since I've posted. But I do have an explanation for myself. See, when my friends and family call me up, this is how the conversation goes-- THEM : So, what have you been up to lately? ME: You know, making cookies. THEM : Uh, huh... trailing off...losing all interest in further conversation with me... I'm tired of the rejection, so I had to hold off on cookies and do something interesting this weekend so that I can still have friends. I ran 7 miles. I figure that will buy me at least 3-5 days. Now I have to quick make some cookies before my interestingness wears off. And I do mean quick. Given that I already had some egg shaped cookies baked, these took less than 10 minutes! And maybe I shouldn't tell you that because now you are going to look at all my mistakes and say, "Yeah...maybe you should have taken your time on those little treasures." But let me tell you something -- You are probably right. In case you are

This does NOT look like an egg.

I was going to make some Easter egg cookies. I meant to. I really did. I rolled out the cookie dough...I got out the egg cutter...and then...I couldn't stop thinking about those chicky cookies I made. I have a problem. My cookies did not come out looking like Easter eggs at all.... For the record...I would definitely NOT recommend trying to make rabbits out of the egg cutter.

Make Your Own Adorable Chickies

I am officially declaring the fuzzy chicky to be my favorite. And I will show you how I made them. But don't worry if its not your favorite. You can adapt these steps to every single one of the chicky cookies. And if you can't figure out how to adapt it...just tell me. I'll help you out. Because I have no life. Let me first just say that I do a lot of wet-on-wet cookies. BECAUSE I AM A NON-WAITER. I have no patience. I want instant gratification. I am sure these cookies would be just as cute if you did the chicks first and filled in a background later. Or if you did them on top of an already dry background. Hmmm....maybe I'll have to try those later.... Also, I use one consistency of icing. Its right down the line between outlining thick and flood icing thick. I go for a count of 12, if you know what I mean. But again...you can do these however you want to. Okay, so start out with a cookie shape of your choice. I love squares, but these would be just as cute o

Chicky Cookies

I wanted to make some little chicky cookies for Easter. I thought about them for a long time. And then I thought a lot about how little chickens are actually kind of gross and not cute at all. And they make an awful noise. But chicky cookies are WAY better than that. And I thought about so many different kind of chicky cookies, that I just couldn't narrow it down to ONE design. I couldn't do it. I couldn't choose ONE and throw all the other adorable faces out the literal window to fend for themselves in the barely-still-winter-and-not-yet-spring cold. Nope. Couldn't do it. So I made them all. Even the weirdy ones. (You'll see.) I made these fuzzy little things. And almost stopped right there.  But then these guys would have been so sad. And no one wants to see a sad Easter chicky. (I can't decide if I like the outlined chicky or the non-outlined one better.) These are my shell guys. My husband calls these the House of Mirror chickies. Except, he obviously

Someone outlined something...

Guess what?! I outlined something! I had big plans to play this one cool and nonchalant, and pretend like I do it all the time...but I can't. Mostly because I'm not a cool and nonchalant kind of person. I'd like to be. I pretend to be. But I'm not. Come on, you know what I'm talking about. You Some girl gets all dressed up and spends WAY MORE time than necessary trying to look good and then when she meets the person she got all dressed up for she waits exactly 2 seconds before her insides are screaming: "Didn't you NOTICE? I'm not ugly today. And it was all for you . Which means I LIKE you. But now maybe I don't because you didn't notice. Which means that YOU don't like ME as much as I like YOU. And if that's the way you feel, then maybe I won't give you these cookies that I spent all day baking and decorating and obsessing over before spending hours trying to feel good about myself in a very superficial way. And it was workin

a sparkling good idea

I have a problem. When I get some "great" idea in my head...I make it. Right then. I don't stop to think about the fact that it will take 3 hours and I only have 12 minutes. I am embarrassed to admit that more than once , I have started making cookie dough, blended the sugar and butter, and then realized that I only have 1 egg. Or no eggs. Or no eggs and no salt and only 1/2 cup of flour. And its the middle of the night and I have two sleeping children and no car and my husband is gone, so there is no way I can go to the store for more. But that doesn't stop me. ( I think maybe that's the real problem. ) I end up trying to figure out how to reconstitute dried egg whites and grind my own wheat and sort out all the pretzel bits from the salt at the bottom of the bag....ummm...hypothetically of course. These cookies were no exception. Great idea? Check. Middle of the night? Check. Missing some important and vital aspect without which my great idea will be barren

Winner, winner, cookie cutter dinner....

I can't believe how many of you wanted that weirdy shape cutter! You know, the one I used for the "thank you" cookies and the leprechauns. Okay, from here on out, I am officially going to call it a....wait for it...... BRACKET SQUARE. There. Now we don't have to make up random terms to describe it. We can just love it. And make things with it. And...well...probably we should avoid squishing it because then it would be mutilated and not at all cute and lovable anymore. I was all prepared to make another one of those, or at least a peeps bunny since those seemed to be the most popular requests. WHAT WILL OUR WINNER CHOOSE? It's up to YOU my friend number 28 -- -- who said, "the cutter I'd like is kind of hard to explain, it is sort of a plaque type of thing, like ornamental mirror or frame shape. I have a picture ."   CONGRATULATIONS  HANIELA !!  I'm sending you an email. But if you don't get it, email me back at LilaLoa@ymail.com And t

a little LUCK

I think it is safe to say that I run with the perfectionist crowd. Maybe run is too strong of a word. Let's go with-  walk quickly with the perfectionist crowd.  (As long as your definition of perfectionism is similar to freaking out over every -single -detail in a cookie and spending 10 minutes on that one last thing that you just can't get right but should be right and then letting it consume your mind for the next 4 days while worrying that everyone will notice how you left that one little bit of flour dust stay on your cookie...  But I'm definitely not a perfectionist if your definition includes a clean house and no dishes in the sink.) I wanted these cookies to be kind of wonky. I tried really hard to make the squares...not squares. It started out great (see the "u"?) But I was fighting a losing battle with the inside part of me that says " These are not squares. You are doing something wrong. FIX IT ." And with each tile, they got square-er and

a bit about couplers

My Wilton couplers drive me crazy ! I am constantly twisting them and pulling them off and readjusting and twisting again until I can get them to thread just right so I can twist them tight enough that the icing doesn't secretly squeeze out the side on its own while I'm not watching and then fall into my most perfect and adorable cookie at some unsuspecting moment and ruin everything. Because I can't tell you how many times that has happened to me. (A lot of times, in case you are wondering.) On the advice of Pam over at Cookie Crazie I got some Ateco couplers from Karen's Cookies . (And as much as I would love all of you to think that Pam and I are close, personal friends, and that she divulged this advice over a quiet lunch together while we laughed and chatted about life, love and cookies... The truth is that she put it on her blog in January. And I read it. And I followed it. And I am SO glad I did.) When I got my couplers, I could see that the base was qui

shamrock flowers

There is a reason I do not have a membership to a bulk-club-warehouse type store. I have no self control when I see candy in mass quantity. It is SO easy for me to walk past the little bags of M&Ms that they put on the shelf next to the cashier at a regular grocery store. I just stand there watching that little bag thinking, " I am SO better than you. Look at me. I don't have to eat you. I am happy as a person without you." But I don't say it out loud because that would be....wait, is that still judgemental even if I only say it in my head? Ahh, you're always distracting me. My point is that in the past, I DID have a membership. And whenever I walked down the candy aisle and stood staring up at a 50 gallon barrel of gumballs, I couldn't move. I would will myself to keep going. I even tried threats. But nothing mattered because the only thing I could focus on was large amounts of candy staring me in the face. I'm powerless, I tell you. My husband wo

free peeps cutter?

~~~GIVEAWAY CLOSED~~~ I am just going to come right out and say this. I don't understand the buzz about the elusive peeps cutter. Probably because I don't really like peeps. By all means, I should -- they are marshmallow and have an interesting texture and they come in all sorts of colors and they have weirdy eyes. What's not to love about weirdy eyes? But I don't love peeps. Like, at all. I do, however, feel bad for all of you trying to find the cutter. Every time I read about another fruitless search, I think to myself, "I could make you a cutter and it would probably take less time than your search" And then I thought -- I COULD MAKE YOU A CUTTER. But, not all of you. Just one person. What I'm trying to say is that I am going to give away a custom cutter.  It doesn't have to be a peeps cutter. It could be anything you want. But not too big because my sheet metal is only so long. And...not a scalloped circle cutter because I'm not THAT good

A Leprechaun Promise

There are two types of cookies that I never wanted to make --leprechauns and cupids. I promised myself I wouldn't. It went kind of like this: Myself: I don't want to make leprechaun cookies. Me: Okay, then don't.  Myself: No, I'm serious. I'm never going to make them. Me: Okay, fine. Myself: Promise me I never have to make them. Me: Uhh, you know I'm not good at that promise thing... A few days ago I was looking through my cutters to see which St. Patrick's Day cutters I have (and the sum total is a clover) and I saw this cutter. And I heard a little leprechaun calling to me. So I HAD to make him. And he was happy. And then he realized he was all alone. And he was not happy anymore. So I HAD to make him some friends. And they were all very happy together. So happy that they started being mischievous and pouring gold into people's gas tanks while they weren't looking. But they didn't tell them so when they took their cars to