Decorating Easter Sugar Cookies

With Easter this weekend, I wanted to think of a couple ways to welcome the special holiday where we celebrate Jesus' death and resurrection, offering us all eternal hope! One of the things I came up with was decorating cookies and the second is having a couple friends over tonight to decorate eggs and put together Easter floral arrangements. 

My friend Ashley and I got together yesterday to decorate some sugar cookies! I used the recipe my grandma always used (I'll share it at the end of the post) and then we iced them with Ashley's frosting recipe, also below.

For the icing, we start by outlining the cookie to create a border for the color, then filling in from there. The top of this cookie is what it looks like when it's done and smoothed out with the tool (see below) and the bottom is what it looks like after outlining with the frosting and filling in with the color inside the boundary before smoothing it out.

We used this little tool to smooth the frosting out. 

I had to show you this adorable little chick cookie!

Isn't she cute?!

Here's another example of outlining with the frosting first...

Then filling in roughly with the frosting...

This is what it looks like after smoothing it all out!

THE DETAILS:

After the first layer of icing is dry, you can go over it with another layer of outlining to add some texture and dimension!

Another fun thing you can do to fancy up the cookies is adding a gold sheen by mixing the gold powder with vodka to create a little gold paint. When it dries it gives it a pretty sheen!

Here are some of my favorites from our day! They're really yummy, too :)

Old Fashion Butter Sugar Cookies

Sift together:
3 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt​

Cream:
1 cup butter (2 sticks)
3/4 c. sugar

Add 1 egg to creamed mixture until incorporated
Add 2 Tbs cream or milk
Add 1 1/2 tsp vanilla

Slowly add the dry ingredients into the creamed mixture until the dough begins to come together. (Don't over beat)  Divide in half and shape into a round disk (approximately 3/4" thick) Wrap in saran wrap.

Refrigerate dough for at least 1 hour.On a lightly floured surface roll the dough out to slightly less than 1/4" thick.

Use your favorite cookie cutter and place cutout onto cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.  Sprinkle with colored sugar (unless you plan to frost the cookies) and bake at 400 degrees for about 6 minutes.  Cool on wire rack.

Icing:
3 cups confectioners sugar1/4 tsp cream of tartar1/2 cup milk
Mix together in a mixer, you can add more liquid or more sugar depending on the consistency. 


Of course, you can make this recipe for any holiday or special event. And I have to say, they're yummy without frosting, too!

xoxo



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