The past week and a half has been very quiet here at Chez Boca. Christmas afternoon was spent in an orgy of paper ripping, followed by oohs, aahs and small squeals of delight (and no, I won't give any indication of who did the most squealing). The evening was spent decorating a metric buttload of Christmas themed sugar cookies.
[Christmasy sugary goodness] [1] [2]
When we made the cookies (a few days before), it was my idea to cut the center out of some of the larger ones just for a variation on a theme. On this tray, I know I painted the tree with the white snow flakes on it, and the larger man shaped one. The rest—don't recall. But I do recall that the royal icing (made from scratch) was very gooey. We used basting brushes for the green and red, and having run out of said brushes, used popsicle sticks for red (and yes, the orange there is actually red—blast that white color balance) and yellow.
[Break out your insulin shots!] [3] [4]
The four gentlemen on this tray were all my work—three soldiers of various ranks, and one civilian running around barefoot. As we progressed, my work got more and more elaborate as I found it rather fun. Let's see … the christmas tree, the small blue star (or “Captain's Wheel” as Bunny called them) and the candy cane was also mine.
[I really start playing around with the cookies] [5] [6]
The more cookies we did, the more elaborate my designs became. The green guy with the orange center was my idea; basically, a large cookie with the center cut out, painted green, with an identical smaller cookie (which actually was the center cut out) painted red (yes, it's red, gosh darn it!) placed over the cut out hole.
And the angel in the lower right was another of my designs. If you look closely at the angel [7], you'll notice two small eyes, which required the use of tweezers.
Yes, I decorated cookies with the help of tweezers.
There's nothing wrong with that, right?
[Leave it to Bunny to make a “Not-Safe-For-Work” sugar cookie] [8] [9]
Yes, the man shaped sugar cookie in the lower left is sans pants (censored for your protection), and for you perverts out there, here's the NSFW (Not Safe For Work) uncensored sugary goodness (NOT SAFE FOR WORK!) [10].
The large girl in the top center is my work. I thought it would be cute to make a little girl holding a doll dressed just like her [11]. Three cookies in the construction of that one, and later Bunny remarked that she wants to preserve it and possibly use it as a Christmas tree ornament.
Reminds me of a programming class I took in college (Computer Science and Engineering at Florida Atlantic University) [12]—the professor actually instructed me to “stop with the overkill!”
I didn't listen then, and now, no one was telling me to stop with the overkill.
[The green snowman is sad because he knows … he knows he'll get eaten (cookie by Bunny)] [13] [14]
By this time, both of us where getting tired of slapping a rapidly drying icing onto cookies and it shows in this last batch of cookies—nothing terribly complicated. Or rather, nothing complicated by me—I was pretty much tapped out at this point.
But it was fun, and the cookies, they are good … nom nom nom
[1] /boston/2008/12/29/thumbs.pc250003.jpg
[2] /boston/2008/12/29/pc250003.jpg
[3] /boston/2008/12/29/thumbs.pc250005.jpg
[4] /boston/2008/12/29/pc250005.jpg
[5] /boston/2008/12/29/thumbs.pc250007.jpg
[6] /boston/2008/12/29/pc250007.jpg
[7] /boston/2008/12/29/sugar-cookie-angel.jpg
[8] /boston/2008/12/29/thumbs.pc250002.jpg
[9] /boston/2008/12/29/pc250002.jpg
[10] /boston/2008/12/29/sugar-cookie-nsfw.jpg
[11] /boston/2008/12/29/sugar-cookie-girl.jpg
[13] /boston/2008/12/29/thumbs.pc250008.jpg