Good morning dear friends!
How are you today? I hope you had a wonderful start of the week. Is the weather getting nice, warmer where you live or is winter still looming? Or are you in the southern hemisphere, anxiously awaiting the first yellow leaves of automn, and the relief of rain after a hot summer?
Here in Cyprus the weather has started to get warmer, but one last cold wave (with snow in the Troodos Mountains) has been announced before we can definitely say hello to Spring, so we are not putting our sweaters away yet. The streets, however, are already lined with yellow flowers, the orange and lemon trees are full of fruits, and the grass has turned a beautiful shade of green. The sun is starting to shine brighter, but the wind still blows colder than it will next month, once Spring will be in full bloom. This is such a nice time of the year to be here, and it is definitely the best time to come visit, in my opinion.
Even though we are not yet in Spring, I have already started getting into a Springy mood…hence these cookies! My husband had to travel to London for a few days, where he was planning to visit a dear friend who has two adorable girls aged 8 and 2 1/2, so I thought that I could add to the presents he was taking them a small box of decorated cookies. I looked into my cookie-cutter box and found a couple of sets I hadn’t used before and set myself to work. I made tulips, daisies and butterflies in different sizes and color combinations, and I played with sanding sugar and sugar pearls in some of them. Decorating is a form of meditation to me, because it allows me to focus completely in what I’m doing, and I love that.
I also made a few other cookies, from a princess set: a crown (which my daughter tried to put on her head on several occasions) a high-heeled shoe, and a pink and white castle:
And to top it all off, I added a few cupcake cookies, with red M&Ms as cherries.
My husband took some of these cookies to his friend’s daughters and the rest were enjoyed by our own children, who were very happy with them! If you have never decorated sugar cookies before, I highly encourage you to do so, it is such a fun activity!
Now about the news I announced: This blog is going to undergo a makeover! 😀
When I started blogging, almost a year ago, I didn’t have the money nor the necessary skills to make it look as pretty as I wanted to, so I simply designed a basic header using a tutorial from Makin’ cute Blogs and a background using a free background generator that I found online. It was ok for a start but it was not what I wanted and, ever since then, I have been looking for ways to beautify my little corner on the internet.
A few weeks ago, I read about a design makeover giveaway being offered by Jessica Sims Design, so I entered it…and I won! I had never won anything in my life before this, so you can imagine how happy I was! I have now sent Jessica my ideas and she will soon get to work on them. I am also working on a few pages I want to add, in order to make this place a little bit more practical and user friendly, and once it is all ready, it will come live. I am very excited about this and I hope you will like the end-result!
I will be back later this week with a few travel related posts about our family trip to Argentina.
See you soon and have a great day!
Ohh Marce! Lucky you!! I can´t wait to see the new “look” of TCG!! And the cookies are beautiful!!! Congrats, my friend! Kisses from Rosario
Que bonitas quedaron las galletas, pondras un tutorial con la receta del glaseado?
Y tengo curiosidad por el nuevo look del blog !
Por aqui el fin de semana tuvimos unos dias soleados, pero por lo demas sigue un poco frio.
Muchos saludos ! Te leo.
Los castillitos quedaron preciosos ! Y tienes razon con lo de que hornear es como meditacion !
Gracias Pauli!
Muchas gracias! Quieres un tutorial con cómo las decoré paso a paso? Yo uso la receta de glacé de sweetopia, que son: 5 cucharadas de meringue powder, 1 cucharada de cremos tartaro. 3/4 taza de agua, 1kg de azucar. Te dejo el link donde ella explica cómo hacerlo: http://sweetopia.net/2011/12/gingerbread-house-royal-icing-video-kitchenaid-7-quart-mixer-giveaway/
Al estar terminado queda super duro, y luego le vas agregando agua de a poquito hasta lograr la consistencia adecuada (la regla de los 20 segundos).
¿Verdad que si? Meditación dulce 🙂
Hola Malche, está todo divino y delicado. me encantaron …por favor pasame la receta en español y conociendo que acá estamos un poco más limitados en ingredientes decime como puedo lograr esa decoración tan hermosa. te felicito por tu trabajo. Besos
Hola Kari! Qué receta necesitas? Las cookies que yo hago son de una receta de Martha Stewart http://www.marthastewart.com/260458/ideal-sugar-cookies
Y el glacé real con el que las cubro lo hago con polvo de merengue (que es basicamente albumen con cremor tartaro y otras cosas) siguiendo esta receta http://sweetopia.net/2012/01/royal-icing-recipe-free-illustrated-recipe/
Como ves, los ingredientes los encontras en cualquier lado, y de hecho yo las hice en Córdoba. El polvo de merengue lo compré en las casas de reposteria mayorista de la calle Libertad, si mal no recuerdo, pero tambien lo encontrás en Marité de la calle Tucumán. Usá colorante en gel o en polvo para no afectar la consistencia del glacé (los compras en el mismo lugar que el polvo de merengue) y usá una boquilla numero 2 o 3 para el relleno y numero 1 para los detalles. Aqui hice un tutorial mostrando cómo lograr volumen en las cookies, y si tenes cualquier duda, no dudes en contactarme! http://thecelebrationgirl.com/2011/06/16/decorated-oreos-the-easy-way-tutorial/
Gracias Malche!!! ya me voy a poner a buscar los ingredientes y me voy a animar a jugar un poco y ver como me salen… te voy a mandar una fotito cuando las haga….me encanta todo lo que estás haciendo y la verdad me estás inspirando mucho para un pequeño emprendimiento que quiero hacer… algún día te cuento cuando pueda ponerlo en marcha. Un beso enorme.
Buenisimo Kari, contame cómo te fue y no dudes en preguntarme si tenes cualquier duda!