Christmas House and Cookies

Here are some more Christmas projects, really enjoyed making the house and cookies, and I don't know why, but somehow the Eiffel Tower has become Christmassy in my book as well ;D The kidlets now want me to make a village of small houses, so methinks that will be next weeks project :D

Have a wonderful evening y'all!!

Christmas To Do list...

OMG Xmas is coming so fast I cannot believe it, isn't it strange that it sneaks up on you EVERY year, one should kind of know by now it will be the 24th of December, shouldn't one?? Well, today has been one of those days when you wake up to an incredible amount of snow pouring down from the skies, and I tell you first reaction was, OMG so do NOT have time to shovel snow right now... But then you take a look at the kids faces when they see the snow and how eagerly they get dressed to go out and play, and you stop for a second and realize that however much I were to complain about it, the snow will continue to pour down from the skies, so I just decided to not worry about it : ) Now ticking off my to do list one thing at a time and slowly but surely things are getting done, maybe not the right things, but things anyway... ;D

Have an Excellent winter evening, light some candles and 

stop for a second if you can in this mad Xmas dash : )

Chocolate Bundt Cakes

Oh my has it been an excellently busy weekend, lots of Christmas cookie decorating going on, so today I   wanted to bake something totally different and chocolate cake it was. And I just had to try my new Nordic Ware garland bundt pan. I found the perfect recipe on Kinuskikissa's blog here and the recipe was a perfect match for the pan, it just filled the 6 small cake pans to 75% and after 35 minutes voilà 6 perfect little cakes emerge. These are filled with small dark chocolate chips roughly chopped with a knife and carefully added to the cake batter, YUM doesn't even begin to describe it :D I think they are so cute as they are, so felt no need to decorate them further, although a little sprinkle of powdered sugar would probably look wonderfully wintery : )

Have an Excellent evening!!

Eiffel Tower Cookies

Got inspired and wanted to make some surprise Eiffel Tower cookies for my sisters party :D I wanted a snazzy colour scheme so had fun with the "Parisienne à l'Extrême" inspired colours, not sure Kate Moss would eat these though, but I really do like the colours! There is just something so crisp and fresh about black, white and using one accent colour. Granted some of the Eiffel Towers look more like the leaning Tower of Pisa... ;D but still had sooo much fun making them! Also made some more kid-friendly snowmen : )

Have an Excellent day!!! :D

Christmas Cookies

Here are some more Christmas cookies I decorated this weekend, just love this time of year!! And feels like we just jumped over autumn here in Finland since we already have snow everywhere and it is ICY cold, an excellent excuse to put up my stars in the windows and fairy lights in the garden :D Not that I ever needed an excuse to put them up early anyway... ;D Today it's time to have some yummy raclette with the little ones, been so busy this weekend so want to make it up to them today with some good food and 100% attention : )

Have an excellent evening y'all :D

Christmas Tree Ornaments

WOW have I been busy decorating cookies :D I made some ornaments for my brother's Christmas tree and  below are some pics of the decorated tree and a close-up of the cookies : ) Nice project indeed, just LOOOVEE everything Xmas!!

Will be back in a sec with more Christmas cookie project pictures :D

Polka Dot House

And so the gingerbread house experiments continue, I just could not shake the thought of a house with a polka dot roof so there you have it, need to work on my icing skills though, still not superhappy with the snow effect, but so far so good :D I learned an excellent new thing from one of the comments on the fabulous pages of Kinuskikissa; if you use heated fruit sugar (fructose) as glue when putting the house together it will dry clear, as opposed to regular sugar that becomes a horrible brown mess... Excellent advice indeed!! Less mess to cover up if you ask me :D

Now gonna concentrate on getting rid of this horrible flu so off to bed I am...

Have an excellent snowy day : )

Home Sweet Home

Allrighty, time for some gingerbread house experimenting : ) And after a few burned fingers from the hot sugar I used to glue it all together, there you have it.  I have to admit I'm not sure if I like it or not... a bit too much snow going on, but in all fareness it's there to hide the not so fabulous gluing job... ; ) But I really like the idea so will continue to perfect it, but it sure is cute sitting here on my desk! The base coat is glaze icing, windows etc. edible pens and royal icing for the snow and ice.

Have an excellent evening y'all : )

Svenska Dagen

Today we are celebrating "Swedish day" in Finland, and my sister is having a party for her friends and I made some cookies for them, and mostly for lots of laughs I decided to make some yellow and blue cookies to fit the daily celebrations :D But what I really want you to focus your attention to is the blue icing in the lower picture!! I got a wonderful blog update email from i am baker and in that post I found the answer to all my icing troubles, i am baker's glaze icing!!!! I am actually wondering if it 's possible for a person to fall in love with icing, but I certainly have!! I will never ever again use anything but this icing on my cookies, LOVE it!! It is easy to make, easy to spread, wonderfully shiny and best of all really tasty :D Thank you for this Amanda!!! Remember to check out i am baker, it is full of the most creative wonderful cakes, cookies and more : )

Have an excellent day!!

Christmas Cookies

I seriously had pumpkins and ghosts coming out of my ears so I was totally excited to start making some Christmas cookies :D Yesterday was all about flooding them with white royal icing and today was decoration time! I used my wonderful new stencils from Designer Stencils and just looooove the tree and wreath ones, the bird on the Christmas tree is especially darling :D Now I'm off to make some gingerbread house walls and roofs so see you later!!

New Product Development

Time for some Christine's Corner packages methinks :D Want to pack my cookies nicely and came up with the above packaging idea to begin with... Made the Halloween "french fry" boxes with my sister in mind, she threw a Halloween party this weekend, be sure to check out her wonderful blog Sirap Sisters and see how nicely everything was decorated and how she used the boxes as place cards!!

Halloween Birthday

My eldest had his birthday yesterday and hoped for a Halloween themed party so I made loads more Halloween cookies, Spider web cupcakes and decorated the house with appropriate skulls, spiders and bats :D Sometimes I wonder who likes these things more, me or the kids ;D But the birthday boy was thrilled to bits and that is what is most important!!

Have a relaxing Sunday : )

Ghost Basket

I mean seriously now, is this not the cutest thing ever!?!? I found this printable basket in the wonderful ThePoshEvent shop on Etsy, and had to print one and assemble one IMMEDIATELY and I tell you it sure puts a big smile on my face :D was going to bed but can't help making more!

Nighty night y'all!

Happy Pumpkins and Startled Ghosts

Just had sooo much fun making these :D Love everything Halloween, especially all the ghosts and skulls!!! I got wonderful new Wilton Halloween cookie cutters yesterday and instantly had to try them, so I baked the cookies and flooded them with royal icing yesterday and today has been all about decorating them, the part I like best in the process : ) I am so happy with my Rainbow Dust double sided pens, they make it so easy to outline the design with the fine tip and fill in with the thick tip! 

Have an excellent evening, I'm off to decorate some more cookies!

Colourful Fleur-de-lis Cookies

The cookie experiment continues, today I have tried my new stencils on royal icing, with my Sugarflair colour pens and I am pretty excited of the results :D I am on a personal quest to find an easy-to-make, cost efficient yet stylish cookie and these are getting closer :D Love the colours: Liquorice, Chocolate, Berry Blue, Cherry Red and Holly Green!

And if my kitchen was messy earlier, there is no describing what it is right now... ;D

but who cares I say!!!

Chandelier Cookies

Got my new stencils from Designer Stencils today and first of all I cannot believe how quickly they arrived and secondly, well I am beyond chuffed at the moment :D This was my first try with stencils but I can only imagine how well they will turn out when I have a better brush and I NEED to try these with food colour spray, the finish will probably be much more precise, but so far so good!! I made the chandeliers and damask with Wilton's black icing colour. The cookies are still the same chocolate cookie recipe as before with white royal icing on top.

I also made some Aunt Jemima pancakes drenched in syrup as an evening "snack" and I tell you stuffed doesn't even begin to describe it.... And the state of my kitchen right now is utter CHAOS so see you later, would do anything for the mess to just disappear but alas that is not going to happen....

Have an Excellent Evening :D

Chocolate Fleur-de-lis Cookies

More chocolate cookies, surprise surprise ;D Had to try my new cookie cutters and since I was so pleased with the last batch of chocolate cookies with chocolate flavoured royal icing, these got the same treatment and I am pleased once again, this recipe sure is a keeper!

Got to go, my new favourite show Nurse Jackie is on!! Who doesn't just loooooove Edie Falco :D

Have an excellent evening!

Chocolate Cookies :D

The cookie experiment continues and I have to say I am beyond pleased right now, I know that's a bit pompous since it has to do with cookies I've made myself... But you know when you have an idea of something you want to try that you have never tried before and then it just works out :D Total happiness!!

I tried a new chocolate cookie recipe today from the fabulous book "CAKES for Romantic Occasions by May Clee-Cadman of Maisie Fantaisie" and I am soooo pleased! I used chocolate flavoured confectioner's sugar to make the royal icing so that was easy and then added white royal icing to make the hearts with a tooth pick :D

I tell you even if it is midnight I am sooooo going to eat some of these right now, because I just cannot resist them, they look too yummy and smell divine!!

Polka Dot Experiment

Today the cookie experiment continued, it was time for different variations of dots : ) Everything on the cookies is royal icing except for the white sugar beads on the brush embroidered flowers. I have never tried making dots after flooding the cookies with royal icing, so it was interesting to see how the difference in icing thickness was key. Also figuring out which Wilton tip to use in the different stages of decorating is difficult, so still a way to go, but already cannot stop thinking about white cookies with black dots on them : )

"Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. Make the most of yourself by fanning the tiny, inner sparks of possibility into flames of achievement."

- Golda Meir -

Fleur-de-lis Cookies

I had to try my new fleur-de-lis silicone mold immediately so here are today's test cookies : ) The usage of the fleur-de-lis throughout history is very interesting and you can read all about it on Wikipedia. I personally think it is a beautiful symbol and since I am still in love with everything black & white, I chose the above colour scheme. I used the same cookies as before, recipe by Mansikkamäki, the white cookies are covered in royal icing, the black one sugar paste, the fleurs-de-lis are made of black sugar paste and white fondant. Let the cookie experiments continue :D

"Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful."

-Albert Schweitzer-

Christmas Cookies ;D

Well obviously Xmas is far away, 105 days still to go :D, yes I am an absolute Xmas nut... but I just felt an urgent need to test baking and decorating some cookies so I have time to perfect my skills in time for Xmas when everything gets hectic and FAST, so going to continue with this project tomorrow, it is soooo much fun, but it does take quite some time and it sure does create quite the mess in the kitchen... 

The cookie recipe is from the fabulous site of Mansikkamäki, obviously also the place that inspired me regarding the decorations, but I am far from ready or pleased with this project yet, want to try loads of different techniques, one especially interesting is brush embroidery so will be back...

Have an excellent start to the weekend : )

Brush Embroidery

Allrighty, here is my first try at brush embroidery and I have got to say, I like the effect and I think this makes the cookies more "edible" since they have less stuff on them... I mean don't get me wrong I absolutely love beautifully decorated cookies but when it comes to taste less is more :D

I decorated these this morning and when my son came into the kitchen he asked, "What time is it Mommy really?" I said why? He said isn't it a bit too early to be making cookies?? ;D Loves it!

Is it ever too early or late to bake?? :D

PS. Here are a few more cookies... just wanted to try different things, thus lots going on on these... ;D

Lemon Cupcakes and Calmness

OK will admit I'm a sucker for all these "Keep Calm" posters :D

Actually made these lemon cupcakes earlier in the week but the days just disappeared somewhere : ) The lemon cupcakes are basically loads of sugar, butter, flour and eggs and some lemon juice and grated lemon peel, topped them with some lemon curd and whipped cream quite yummy I might add, they vanished pretty quickly....

Ducks for Breakfast

Woke up this morning and felt like eating a duck, no idea why, but there you go ; ) The animal lover I am ducks are obviously made out of pancakes and chocolate... Kiddos were obviously happy this morning and the above have long since been eaten...

The duck is white chocolate coloured with Chefmaster's yellow candy color.

I hope you have a Sunny start to the day!

Rose and Bow

Wanted to practise using my Wilton rose tip again with whipped cream, and it really helps to put the roses in the freezer for a while and then move them onto the cupcake. It is so much easier making them with the flower nail and not directly onto the cupcake... I tried Martha Stewart's fluffy vanilla frosting (see pic below) as well and will definetly colour it next time and test making Martha's grass with ladybugs on =D 

See you soon!

Happy Mother's Day : )

Just love this day! Got some of the cutest gifts in the morning, there just is something so precious about the things the kidlets make in school with mommy in mind =D My mom came over for Mother's Day coffee and I wanted to serve her something with strawberries, and this is what I came up with: caramelized oat biscuits with mascarpone cream (mascarpone, whipped cream, sugar, vanilla extract and grated lemon peel) to dip the strawberries in! The yellow butterfly is marzipan and the combo was pretty yummy : )

Black Butterflies

I woke up this morning with a strong visual of black butterflies, and well, when inspiration hits there is no stopping it =D and here is the result:

I am so pleased with this one, everything just worked out brilliantly from start 'til finish =D It is a sponge cake filled with raspberries in whipped cream and rasberry jam. I used diluted orange juice to moisten the cake. Topped it with sugar cream and white marzipan whitened with Wilton's White-White icing colour. The butterflies are black sugar paste. Very happy now and off I go to serve my impatient kiddos some cake =D 

My first rose =D

I have always admired how professionals make such wonderful roses out of whipped cream, so now that I have the right Wilton tip, a.k.a. #123, I just had to try my hand at making one with the help of the fabulous instructions by Kinuskikissa and here is my first rose:

Excited to pieces right now, I have to admit ;D

Jaws.... ;D

Today's project, shark cupcakes! The boys saw them in Martha Stewart's Cupcakes and soooo wanted me to make some : ) Made dark & white chocolate cupcakes and covered them with blue whipped cream frosting, blue cake sparkles and black shark fins.

And here they are:

Found a scary shark pic so made some matching cupcake wrappers =D

And yup, you guessed it, the kitchen looks thereafter as usual... so see you later! : )