Mickey Mouse Birthday Cookies
The Challenge
I was asked to make Mickey Mouse themed cookies for a 2 year old’s birthday. It honestly makes me nervous to try and depict well known characters in cookie form. There are so many ways they could go full Chinese knock off on you!
Beijing’s imitation Disneyland…the horror…
I decided to keep it very simple and ordered this set and this sandwich cutter. I kept my colors to black, red, white, and a little bit of tan. Since I’m addicted to the Disney Tsum Tsum Game (sigh at least I don’t have to pay any money to enjoy this game) I went with a simplified “Tsum Tsum” style Mickey face.
The Results
Of course a stuffed Mickey Tsum Tsum had to be included in this picture.
I have problems doing the same things over and over, so I messed around with M and 2 styles.
Passable, but I see my many flaws! I had fun downloading a Disney style font, typing in the birthday girl’s name and practicing the lettering. I had some problems with my icing consistency and nearly had a heart attack when the humidity started to warp everything. I shut every window in the house, slammed the AC on high and blasted a fan. Luckily that seemed to save the icing. Humidity = death to royal icing.
I free handed the Micky face each time. I probably could have gotten a more consistent look if I had traced his face out. I have to learn not to cut corners. Also I’m not sure why, but all the buttons ended up having a depression. The icing seemed fine when I placed it, but during the drying process it caved in a little. I have to investigate this more.
Next Time
I fixed my icing consistency issues on my next batch of cookies (more on that in a future post). I’d like to make more Tsum Tsum characters in cookie form soon, but that also means custom cutting out dough and using multiple colors. I’m too lazy for that!!
I thought this was a cool shot of the outline of the Mickey cutter in flour. Artsy fartsy right?
I actually tried it! Avocado Ranch Dressing
It’s stupid, but I am always ridiculously proud when I try something on the Internet in real life! What I’m not just browsing, but doing? I’m doing!
I am an avocado freak and yes I do worry about adding to the Oro Verde (Green Gold) gang wars in Mexico. Although clearly not enough to stop buying avocados by the bag. At least I try to get California ones….(liberal guilt intensifies)
Anyways…there are quite a few avocado ranch dips/dressings out there, but I liked this recipe from Cooking Classy because it had Greek yogurt instead of sour cream and fresh herbs instead of a ranch dip packet. I didn’t add the milk because I wanted a thicker dip like consistency. Mmmm this was really delicious! I was making it for Southwestern egg rolls, but I would put this on everything.
It is easy to make (~10minutes) and clean up is mostly just my food processor.
Avocado Greek Yogurt Ranch Dressing
Image from Cooking Classy. Go check out this recipe!
Happy Places #1
I would love to travel to Tokyo to see the Crystal Universe exhibit. I am a magpie by nature and sparkly, twinkly things are my happy place. – More information at Spoon and Tamago
Interactive museum display made with LED lights.
This project reminds me of the new span of the Bay Bridge. When it opened in March of 2013 they had beautiful lights built in with the pattern controlled by the artist, which lasted until March of this year. Thankfully they are going to bring back the lights in 2016 as a permanent installation. This is a great video on the thought process and creation of the bridge lights and well worth the 7 minutes.
Rosy Birthday Cookies
My mother’s best friend had a big 65th birthday party last month and asked for cookies as favors for her guests. She came over to comb through my cookie cutter collection and settled on the sakura and marquee style shapes. We decided on a color palette of pale pink, white, and black. She also wanted a cookie for the kids. In all honesty making the different icing colors is my least favorite part about the process, so I suggested doing a rabbit so I could use the pink and white icing. Lazy or efficient?
This is where I get really excited! I was curious about trying royal icing pre-made decorations. Icing curious? That’s a thing. Sweet Sugarbelle has an amazingly simple and detailed tutorial on making easy swirl roses. (Tutorial HERE) I had to go buy a star and leaf tip. I have only used straight lining tips in all my cookies making years. At first I made the icing too runny and it wouldn’t hold the star tip details, but I just thickened it up with some more powdered sugar. Then I was afraid the leaves were too delicate, but I was pleasantly surprised by how robust these roses were!
I ended up making a ton and still have a bunch stored away in an airtight Tupperware in my pantry.
My original idea was to do pink stripes in the white icing, but I lack the skills to make that look great, so hey improvisation! I used the classic dragging the toothpick through wet icing technique to create background interest. I’m still working on my icing penmanship. Adding the previously made roses was a piece of cake after the bottom layer of icing dried and the 3D effect really made these cookies feel special.
The piping icing for my words was a little too thick and made it harder to write smoothly. I’m still learning how to gauge icing flow. Can you tell I get bored with doing the same design? I need to switch it up frequently.
Cleaning up my Blog Feeds
Since I’ve started to post again I decided to go through all my blog feeds, delete some old ones, and add some new ones. I use Feedly (I was in love with Google Reader before they decided to kill it), and it’s amazing how the now dead blogs represent where I used to be in life. There are the budgeting for college students blogs, single girl in the city blogs, weight loss (oops still need that), and wedding blogs.
I actually feel guilty deleting some of the blogs because they hadn’t updated in over a year. I haven’t updated in practically 2 years and yet here I am. I’m excited to find fresh new voices and beautiful pictures to sigh over. Am I already getting blog envy? Have I used the word blog enough to make it completely weird sounding in my head? (Yes!)
I just searched for a free Creative Commons photo for this blog entry too! After only 10 minutes of research I find I like Pixabay the most because I didn’t have to create an account and it was super fast to find something I wanted. This is why I am a cheerful novice. I’m new (and not so great) at everything, but I love to learn!
My 463rd return to blogging!
I’m probably exaggerating and this is only my 455th return to blogging. A lot has changed since my last post. The biggest thing is that I had a baby, and I’m taking a year off of teaching to be a SAHM. The baby part is mostly what I expected, but the SAHM stuff is fairly weird. I don’t think I’ve figured out my groove without work yet.
Aside from baby, things that being home has taught me already (2 months in….)
- My house is cleaner, but less clean?! I’m organizing all the nooks and crannies, but the dishes still pile up and the laundry presents a never-ending Mount Doom.
- I need to GET OUT OF THE HOUSE every day for a least a little bit.
- The Property Bros are dangerous. I am in my house so much now I want to change things in every room. I found myself picking up a hammer after watching HGTV and thinking, “Hey I can demo and install a new back splash today!”
- My old hobbies are great, but a little hard with the tiny human, so I need some more flexible pursuits.
- I spend more money despite earning nothing now.
I am making cookies again! More on that to come next!
Behold my new 3 tier cooling rack. I feel very baker bad ass right now.
Ranunculus Dracula
It’s ranuculus season! Joy! I would have draped my entire wedding in them if I had only done it two months earlier. Bow down to the lion headed, cabbage shaped, bushy, pedal filled flowers. They come in such a wide variety of colors and are in all the garden centers for cheap right now. Go forth and enjoy this delicious flower for a few weeks.
I was experimenting with my little point and shoot for a very dramatic shot.
Return of the Baker
First year teaching is a time suck. That’s an understatement. Teaching is a life suck, but I love it and I’m grateful to have found my passion. On the other hand I miss doing craft/hobby/baking type things. I made these cookies for a friend’s bridal shower in December. I tried to borrow elements from the wedding invitation and match colors as much as possible. I loved the feeling of being creative and getting into a zen mind frame; however my husband would tell you I go scary hyper focused when I decorate.
I loved her sweet graphics and color scheme.
Among the many reasons I could never sell my cookies is that I get bored doing the same design over and over again. It was fun trying to figure out multiple wedding dresses. Then I gave them a light glitter dusting.
I’m always trying to improve my icing penmanship…it is still a work very much in progress!
Happy Halloween! (Wait, it’s almost February!)
I have been without a camera since August when our DLSR was stolen. Finally we just purchased a new digital camera (Canon Powershot S95, it’s pretty nifty!). I feel bad that my life has been so devoid of cookie decorating because of my school schedule. Here are some cookies I made for Halloween and just downloaded off my cell phone.
I took the design idea from a napkin, although you can see I couldn’t resist throwing down a little Batman.
The hexagon cookies cutters were bought so I can eventually make my own Settlers of Catan cookie game board. Hmm I have a few days off this week….
Cross stitch pendants
Knitting and crochet have been a big fat FAIL for me. I can’t seem to get past the one scarf per year, but I can always come back and spend hours doing cross stitch. I learned in home ec club back in middle school. Oh yes, Home Ec club, photography club, debate club, and band in middle school. I was the classic epitome of nerd and it felt good.
Right, back to cross stitch. The Workroom sells these gorgeous birch laser cut pendants in several shapes. When I ordered they only had the oval, but now the other shapes are back in stock and on my to buy list. I decided to make some for Christmas presents.
Although they might be too large for my friends to wear as a necklace they can also hang it on the wall, make a belt buckle, a barrette pin, or…well I’m sure there are other things. I love the small size, it gave me a certain freedom and I felt that I could easily accomplish this task without a lot of stress.
I haven’t had a the energy to experiment with baking lately, but at least small fun crafts like this keep me from just becoming a total couch potato when I need a down night.
The Cheerful Novice 