Quest for Snowflake Cookie Cutters

Growing up in the Midwest, wintertime was a magical time with plenty of snow! A lot of my childhood memories are in wintertime.  We all know that as a child there are not many cares or worries, just fun, fun, fun.  It's not until we get older that we start to experience life and that it's not all fun and games!  Although it gets really cold in Montana, we loved to play outside.  Building snow angels, snowmen, snow forts, carving furniture out of large snowballs, sledding, and inner tubing, oh my what we didn't try...  It was a wonder that none of us broke any bones!  We had an outside ice skating rink near our neighborhood, we spent a lot of time there.  I learned to ice skate fairly young, but never learn to roller skate.  They say, if you can do one you can do the other, but I don't know about that part... I've never roller skated! I guess the if we had of had more sidewalks where I lived I would have experience this too, but we lived on the edge of town where there were very few sidewalks.  I even remember that one winter my dad painstakingly and with much love , I know now... but didn't then that it was for our safety, he made us our own personal ice skating pond in our back yard. We live on a piece of land that was about an acre or two.  I do miss the snow now, but I sure don't like the cold since I've gotten just a little older.  I'm sure I will sacrifice some warmth to see our grand daughter experience some of these wintertime activities... of course when she is a little older!   

My most favorite time of the winter when I was a child was when it is slightly warm outside...  now remember it is still very cold outside!  It seemed like there was a quietness at this time, a real silence in the air...  probably just my imagination!   Large snowflakes falling all around me, and just laying in the snow and making snow angels!  This I remember doing several times in my childhood laying in the snow... and each time after making these snow figures with the snowflakes falling all around me, just pondering the creation of God and were I fit into it!  I would just lay there on the cold snowy covered ground... looking up into the sky and ponder life, and want to know more about Jesus.   I'm so thankful he heard my faintest cry and he surely didn't forget about me!  He has brought me to the best he has in this earth! 

We'll enough about Laurie's ramblings of her childhood.  I have been looking for a couple of snowflake cookie cutters and this has been an experience also...  I thought I would share my findings.

I was surprised to find so many styles of snowflake cookie cutters.  I know that some of these cutters are the same as other cutters.   You can see its all in the way you cut your snowflakes out and decorating the cookie... truly it is hard to exhaust ways to decorate them! 

I like this snowflake that I found at fancyflours blogsite.  She was very creative with her design. From the texture of sugar sprinkles to the varied sizes of the pearl sprinkles.

 

Here is one that I found on Grace Designs blogspot. I really these because they have more of an essence of real snowflakes about them, because of all the holes.  She had reference this site for these cutters... http://www.coxandcox.co.uk/products/snowflake-cookie-cutters .

 

 

These cookies look similar to the ones above, they are an older set I found from Williams and Sonoma.

 

 

 

  

 

 

Excellent design byfrazicake

 

 

 

These are some very nice copper snowflake cookie cutters below.  I really like the copper cookie cutters, but the cost always gets me.  They are just a little more pricey than aluminum and tin cutters.... this means you can get more cutters for the cost of the copper ones!

 

 

 

Sur La Table  

 

Old River Road Copper Regal Snowflake

found at Casa.com or at Kitchenworks Inc. for $8.00.  Here are a few others below from old River Road that I found on Amazon.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This one above is from Copper Snowflake from Counrty Kitchen Sweetart.

 

 

These are interesting snowflake cookie cutters below.  It looks like the largest cutter is about 5-6 inches in diameter and then they all get smaller from there.

 

 

Irresistiblecookiejar.com/ $14.00                 Kitchenfantasy.com/ $12.00

 

cookiecuttershop/ $12.00

  

I found a picture of a cookie in progress of a finished cookie, so you could really see what these cookies would look like, as you can see they are a layered style of cookie.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                      

        

 

 

 

 R and M Cookie Cutters and you can find these at Copper Gifts , these are about $9.00 dollars.

 

 

 

These cutters are made by Fox Run company and found at the Irresistible Cookie Jar .

 

 

 

 

 

You can find this one at Shop Bakers Nook.  They have an abundance of baking supplies also!

 

 

 

Both of these sets below... I've seen at a couple different places.

 

 

 

This set is from the company R M International and I found them at Cake Supplies Depot for $13.00.   

 

 

This set of 7 cookie cutters... I found at Off the Beaten Path for #13.00 and also found at the Fondant Source for $11.00.  I also found one on Etsy for $12.00.

 

 

 

Here is a Large Fancy Snowflake from Candyland Crafts.

 

 

We'll hope you enjoyed the journey, as for me I am just a little more confused than I was on which set I want because, I like them all and they are all very nice!    But, some of these are the came cookie cutters and I guess it's all in the decorating and designing your snowflake cookies! 

 

 

Children's Wooden Blocks

This is a project I have been so looking forward to making for a long time, now I have a good reason to start...  I know that these blocks will get lots of use from not only my grand daughter, but the daycare children as well.  


 

This truly is a project I have been so excited and eager to start making.  Gathering up all the required items to start this project.  I'm going to use 1.5 inch wooden blocks made from maple or birch.  I have also spent a lot of time designing and thinking about what I want these wooden blocks to look like when I'm finished, and what I want to put on them. 



Of course you probably know what little characters that I'm going to put on the wooden blocks... Yes, that correct... Beatrix Potter's furry little friends!

 

All wooden blocks should have these few basic components...  that is alphabet letters, numbers, colors, and pictures.  I have decided that I want some picture puzzles on the blocks also!







We'll in the process of designing these blocks, I decided to change one of my basic thoughts and this was... Originally I wanted these blocks to have the 10 basic colors which was white, black, brown, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink, but in putting these 10 colors on the blocks, I noticed that the blocks weren't going to be as lively/visual as I wanted them to be with these cute little characters.  There would have only been one small picture on each block, and the puzzle picture.  But I opted for two pictures on each block and the puzzle pictures.  The blocks still have solid colors from the _____, sage and lavender... I think this makes for a great color combination! 



The 10 colors... I decided I'm going to make another set of blocks because I'm enjoying making this set of blocks right here!   The new set of blocks will more of a domino size but just a little bigger.  I'm looking at wooden blocks that are 2-1/4" wide x 1-1/2" tall x 3/16" thick, this will make for a real nice memory/concentration game using the 10 colors and of course some more of these cute little characters!

Now these are the pictures I'm going to use for the four puzzles that I'm putting on the blocks.

 

 

 

 

 

The pictures above is where I strategically laid out the characters/or pieces in the way I wanted to present them on the blocks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The process that I went thru in preparing these blocks was to cut out all the letters and numbers, and to glue all the square pictures on the blocks. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I've had alot of fun doing these blocks and really want to make the other set that I mentioned  earlier.  Who knows I might even make a couple smaller sets and put them in my etsy shop.  I would even consider doing some smaller custom orders  sets... if given ample time to complete block sets because these blocks are very detailed blocks.  If anyone is interested contact me thru my etsy shop... purplesageoriginals.

Happy New Year

Wishing you and yours a Wonderful New Year filled with peace, joy, happiness....  and of course many more days of creativity!  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Trip with Friends to Duff's Cakemix

About a month ago...  I have a dear friend, Rhonda ask me if I had heard of a place in West Hollywood where you could go and decorate cakes.  I told her that I hadn't... but would love to check it out, so she gave me the website to check it out for myself. 

 

 

A DIY cake shop... so we put a group together to go decorate cakes!

 

 

 

Oh Joy... Edible Art

 

Here's a link to Duff's Cakemix website, so you can check it out for yourself!

 

 

 

Here's some pictures that we took while we visited the DIY cake shop on Saturday, December 22, 2012. 

  

We all had so much fun that I'm sure will do it again with another group.   After sharing pictures with other friends, there were several more that expressed a real interest and had never heard of the place. 

 

So... Yes, we will definitely do again!

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm a pre-planner... I already had an idea going into cakemix what Stephanie and I were going to create on our cake, but I wasn't sure what the outcome would be because this was my first time ever working with fondant.  We took my little oriental flower cookie cutters with us, wasn't sure if we would do cherry blossoms or the five pedal flowers.  The pearl malted milk balls where bigger than I had pictured in my mind, but that's the only size they had at the goody bar.  Then to give the flowers just a little depth and texture, I took some food coloring, diluted it and brushed the some pedals of the flowers.  After doing this water coloring it took on a hydrangea look! 



  

Gingerbread Cookies and the Royal Icing

This is one of the BEST reciped I have found for Gingerbread Cookies.  I have had so mant compliments from it.... so feel free to give it a try for yourself!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Gingerbread Cookie Recipe

 

 

 

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Cook Time: 12 minutes

Ready in: 4 hours

Servings: 6 dozen = 72

 

 

Ingredients:

 

 6 cups all-purpose flour

1 Tablespoon baking powder

1 Tablespoon ground ginger

1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon ground cloves

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 cup shortening, melted and cooled slightly

1 cup molasses

1 cup brown sugar, packed

1/2 cup water

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

 

 

Directions:

 

Sift together the flour, baking powder, ginger,nutmeg, cloves, and cinnamon; set aside.

 

In a medium bowl, mix together the shortening, molasses, brown sugar, water, egg, and vanilla until smooth.  Gradually stir in the dry ingredients, until they are completely absorbed.  Divide dough into 3 pieces, pat down to 1 1/2 inches thickness, wrap in a plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 3 hours.

 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).  On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough out to 1/4 inch thickness.  Cut into desired shapes with cookie cutters.  Place cookies 1 inch apart onto an ungreased cookie sheet.

 

Bake for 10 - 12 minutes in the preheated oven.  When the cookies are done, they will look dry, but still be soft to the touch.  Remove from the baking sheet to cool on wire racks.  When cool, the cookies can be frosted with the icing of your choice.

 

 

 

The Royal Icing Recipe

 

 

 

Makes 3 cups

 

3 Tablespoons meringue powder

4 cups sifted confectioner's sugar (powdered)

6 Tablespoons water

 

 

Beat all ingredients at low speed for 7 - 10 minutes, or until icing forms peaks. 

 

Tip: Keep icing covered with a wet kitchen towel at all times, the Icing can dry out quickly.

We'll our cookies aren't as polished as all these others that you see, but we are truly going to have time to brush up on our skills.  Gracie had alot of fun creating also.... we put her in the high chair right beside the kitchen counter and she gave all the orders and had her ABC cookie cutters scattered all over from her tray, in her seat and all over the floor.... she will be a big help when she is older! 



Now here is someone that loves color and was very happy and defiantly very creative with their gingerbread cookies.....