hand painted heart and diamond ring bridal party cookies

Sometime last summer, my friend Monica asked me to make bachelorette party cookies to go inside of goody bags that she was putting together. She was the Matron of Honor for her little cousin, and they were going to be travelling to Cabo for the party. She wanted a pink and gold theme, and wanted to customize the cookies with the names of each of the ladies. We ended up deciding on heart cookies and engagement ring cookies, each decorated with pink roses and greenery, with one white heart cookie for the bride and the rest of the cookies pink. This was definitely going to be a fun cookie project!

For the engagement ring cookies, I used a cutter from Cookie Cutter Kingdom, and my favorite sugar cookie and royal icing recipes (which you can find in my book, The Hello Kitty Baking Book!). Once the cookies were baked and cooled, I started to decorate with white icing for the diamond, and finished with gold icing for the ring (tinted with Americolor gold gel-based food coloring). For a tutorial on how I did this, you can see my previous engagment ring cookie post here.

Then I finished by using pink stiff icing to pipe tiny rosettes, followed by stiff green icing to pipe green leaves (using this leaf tip).

I thought they turned out pretty cute, and the rosettes and leaves added a nice feminine touch.

For the heart cookies, I used this heart cookie cutter set (which I also used for these lovebird wedding favor cookies and these lovebird bridal shower cookies).



Even though I only needed one white heart cookie for the bride, I made several in case I messed up on painting her name!

For the gold letter painting, I used a combination of gold luster dust mixed with clear vanilla extract to form a "paint", and then used a food-safe brush to paint the caligraphy names.

 

I loved the combination of the rings and hearts together! 

Happy Bachelorette Party, Victoria!

red and white lovebird cookies

Just last week, a friend of a friend asked me to make cookies for her sister's wedding shower dinner. She wanted favors for the guests to take home with him, and after seeing the lovebird cookies that I made for my brother's wedding a couple of years ago, and she requested them in red and white.

For the cookies, I used my favorite sugar cookie recipe (you can find the recipe in my book, The Hello Kitty Baking Book!), rolled it out to about 1/8 inch thick and cut out shapes with a heart-shaped cookie cutter (the largest one from this nested set of heart cookie cutters). Then I baked them at 350F for 10-12 minutes until they were golden around the edges.

Once all of the cookies were baked and cooled, I whipped up a batch of royal icing (recipe also in my book!), and used stiff icing to outline half of the heart, before filling it in with runny icing.

Next I tinted about a third of the icing super red (that's the actual name of the color!), and used stiff red icing to outline the other half of the cookie, before filling it in with red runny icing.

After letting the icing dry for several hours (I usually let them dry overnight), I was ready to add the lovebird details! I started by piping a brown branch for the lovebirds to sit on (done with medium running icing), and once that was dry I piped golden yellow beaks and little bird feet on the branch.

Then I used black stiff icing to pipe the little eyes, using the smallest piping tip I had.

I also added little wing details. And then they were done!

Aren't they cute?

Do you like them better in red and white, or the original blue and white?

Congratulations to the bride and groom!

lovebird cookies

This past summer, my little brother got married! And it was such a beautiful wedding! He and his wife were married on a beautiful ranch in Carmel, among beautiful scenery, a view of the ocean, and grazing sheep nearby. And all of our family were there to celebrate with them. It was a beautiful day. And I had the privilege of making cookies for their wedding favors!

My brother and his wife love birds, so we decided on these lovebird cookies. I saw the original design at Little Wonderland, and thought it would be perfect for them! Their wedding colors were robin's egg blue and coral, so we decided on blue and white birds, with a coral beak and feet. I used my favorite sugar cookie recipe, which you can find in my book, and this heart cookie cutter which I found on Amazon. (I actually purchased several different heart cookie cutters, because I was looking for the perfect size and shape of heart! Some were too narrow, or too small, but this one was perfect!)

After the cookies were baked and cooled, I started on the royal icing (recipe also in my book!). I used white stiff icing and a small round tip to pipe the outline for the white bird, and then I filled it in with white runny icing.

Then I did the same for the other half of the cookie, using stiff blue icing for the outline, and then filling in with runny blue icing. (I used this gel-based food coloring get the perfect robin's egg blue!)

I let the cookies dry for several hours, before adding the details. First, I used brown semi-runny icing to create the branches.

Once that was dry, I used coral icing to create the beaks and the feet.

Then I used black stiff icing for the eyes, and then stiff white and blue icing for the wing details.

Aren't they sweet?

My brother's wife even made cute little cookie tags for me to package them up with!

I'm SO happy for them! Here are some pictures from their amazing day.

Congratulations Michael and Robin!!!