Be Inspired Round-Up and a WINNER!!

There were some truly unbelievable entries in last month's BE INSPIRED challenge. In case you forgot, the challenge was to use this inspiration board to create birthday cookies. And as much as I wanted to stare at these pretty pictures all month... once the submissions started rolling in, I never looked back. Let's take a quick look at some of my favorites.

I actually don't even have real words to describe how much I love these cookies by Mint Lemonade. The colors are gorgeous...and the multiple shades of orange together are like a burning fire summer sun of perfectness. And the perfect silvery chain across and around the cookies is so so pretty!!

You know what else is super pretty and incredible? The shading of the sky behind those pillars. And the sharp pennant lines receding into the background. And also the elaborate fairy tale lettering on the wooden signs...and the tufted cake!!! Why are they still making calendars of cats? They should be contacting Mike from Semi Sweet! I would LOVE to see what he would come up with for the month of September.

Seriously, don't hate me because I shared this photo. Kari at Yankee Girl Yummies actually has a complete photo before the cookie was broken. But I love this one best. First, the scroll work on the door is lovely, the brick is SO wonderful and the addition of a party balloon to the handle was creative genius. And the shattered icing, like so many birthday dreams is so evocative of the emptiness post huge-giant party that I just can't turn away. (I clearly love this since I just used the word evocative to describe a cookie. That's a little weird.)

And last, but definitely not least are these delicately piped cookies of goodness. Haniela is certainly no stranger to a pulchritudinous cookie. (What? I already said evocative. There's no going back. I'm pulling out all the stops today.) (Pulchritudinous means breathtaking beauty.) (I've never actually used that word before.)

And that brings us to the winner....

of the BE INSPIRED challenge....

and the $50 Etsy gift card...

and that winner...

chosen by random.org is...

MIKE from SEMI SWEET!!!

Congratulations Mike! I'm sending you an email... but if you don't see it today, feel free to email me as well!

Thank you to EVERYONE who participated in the June Challenge! It was a tough one! If you want to see the rest of the BE INSPIRED entries, click HERE.

And if you want to enter this month's fun Add Something Extra Challenge, click HERE.