Monthly Archives: March 2013

March 29, 2013 · 8:00 am

Rainbow Krispy Treats

Krispy Treats with Fruity Pebbles mixed in.

I have been wanting to make these for awhile.

I went to the store to get the ingredients and the Fruity Pebbles were special neon colors! Perfect for me because basically that means red is replaced with pink and the rest of the colors are a little brighter. My perfect palette. 🙂

Mix together 4 cups of Rice Krispies and 2 cups of Fruity Pebbles.

Melt 3 tablespoons of butter in a medium pot on low heat, then add an entire bag of regular marshmallows (4 cups if using mini marshmallows).

Once they are completely melted (this takes an eternity), pour over the cereal and mix with a wooden spoon or rubber spatula quickly until all cereal is coated.

Dump into a 13×9 pan sprayed with cooking spray. Spray cooking spray on hands and press down into pan as evenly as possible. Wait at least 2 hours. (Torture, I know.)

Invert the pan on a cutting board and cut into 2 inch squares.

I LOVE these. They’re not overly fruity because we just used a small amount of Fruity Pebbles. Plus, they’re fun and pretty and easy. And they would go perfectly with Easter!

Recipe adapted from Kellogg’s and Cookies and Cups.

4 Comments

Filed under Misc

Tagged as cereal, fruity, marshmallows, rainbow, rice krispy treats

March 26, 2013 · 8:00 am

Santa Cruz Wedding Treats

Last October I made treats for the dessert table for a friend’s Santa Cruz Beach Wedding. Unfortunately I was not able to make it to the wedding because it was out of town and during the week. Another friend who was in the wedding party delivered the goodies for me, but I forgot to take any photos before I handed them over. The wedding photos just came in, so I wanted to share the treats now!

I made 2 different flavors of mini cupcakes. The tiffany blue ones were bubblegum flavored (see here) and the pale yellow ones were lemonade flavored (see here).

Of course I also made cookies. The couple has a beloved boxer that actually took part in the ceremony and was in all the pictures. The bride asked for cookies of their pup, and this is what I came up with.

I had a hard time trying to get the facial features down, so I decided to stick to the basic outline and the coloring. (He has pale grey spots on his body.)

The wedding favors were classic S’more Pops (see here and here). I made simple little tags with the Bride and Groom’s name and their wedding date.

Thanks Katie for letting me use your pictures! Like I mentioned, I forgot to take photos of these treats… all photo credits go to Grandeur Photography.

4 Comments

Filed under Cakes, Cookies, Marshmallows

Tagged as bubble gum, buttercream, icing, lemon, s'more, sugar cookies, tiffany blue, wedding

March 19, 2013 · 8:00 am

Sesame Street Birthday

Drew just turned 1! He was still in the belly for the baby celebration that I made the green onesies for from this post.

The party theme was Sesame Street, and I got to make all the treats!

Of course there had to be character cookies. I don’t have the cutters, so I made do with what I had. Cookie Monster and Elmo were created with a flower cutter and an egg cutter. For Big Bird I just bent my balloon cutter a bit to make the beak straight.

For these characters, I knew black outlining was the way to go. It really make the features and colors pop.

As always, I free-handed the designs. Cuz that’s how I roll.

Last minute I decided I had to have cookie cereal to go on the cookie monster cookies. I got the idea from cupcakes like this that I’m sure just about everyone has seen at some point. It’s pretty genius whoever thought of it!

I also made cupcakes in the same colors as the characters. Piped simple swirls, and make custom cupcake toppers.

My husband actually made them on the computer for me and I just cut and put them together. 🙂

My most favorite part was the smash cake! Mama asked for it to be Cookie Monster, so I swirled it in bright blue frosting and piped the happy little face on the top.

Then I stuck cookie cereal to the sides. 🙂

Mama said Drew loved his cake. Once he got started, it was hard to get him to stop!

10 Comments

Filed under Cakes, Cookies

Tagged as blue, boy's birthday, buttercream, icing, red, sugar cookies, yellow, yellow cake

March 12, 2013 · 9:30 am

Minty Chocolate Cake Mix Cookies

These cookies are EASY PEEZY.

Did you know that I have a tag for easy cookies? In the right column there is a tag cloud of words that I use most often. If you find “easy cookies” you will see all the recipes that I tagged like this one. Because they’re so easy!!

These start with a basic box of cake mix. I chose Chocolate Fudge flavor (by my girl Betty) because I wanted them as rich and chocolatey as possible.

Beat cake mix with 2 eggs and 1/2 cup of oil and voila! Cookie dough.

To these I added about 1/2 bag of these wonderous Andes Mint Baking Chips. I have had these for a while and finally got around to making something with them. I thought St. Patty’s day approaching would be the perfect time because they’re green!

Scoop 1/2 tbsp sized balls onto a parchment lined baking sheet and bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes. (10 if you like a softer cookie, 12 if you want a crunchier cookie.) I like to use a mini cookie scoop so that they all come out the same size. Let cool for a couple minutes before moving to a wire rack. They come out puffy but deflate a little and set up nicely.

These were not too chocolatey (perfect for me) but nicely minty like a girl scout cookie.

4 Comments

Filed under Cookies

Tagged as chocolate, easy cookies, mint

March 8, 2013 · 8:00 am

Sharing My Sketches

As promised, I would like to show my sketches, mock-ups, and how I tend to plan when I’m working on a set of cookies. (Most of the images will open bigger if you click on them.)

Sometimes when I know the shapes and designs I am doing but I just need to work out the number of each and the colors, my mock-up/planning looks like this: (correlating cookies are here, here, and here)

In the 2 mock-ups below, I listed out the shapes on the left and the colors of buttercream and icing necessary for each design on the right. I try to limit the colors of buttercream as much as possible. (correlating cookies are here, here, and here.)

If all the cookies are the same, I might just trace the cookie cutter a few times and sketch out designs until I’m happy with it. I did that for these bird cookies:

For this sea creatures set, I traced each of the animals once and did a lot of erasing until I was happy with each animal. I wanted the whole set to have the same “feel” of simple and cartoon-ish, and I knew I wanted them all to have the same eyes. One couldn’t be too much more detailed than the rest so it helped me to have them all together on one page like this.

Other times I trace the cutter over and over and do something different in each one. Then I decide which I like best if they’re all going to be the same… (correlating cookies here)

…or if I want a variety in my set, it helps me brainstorm ideas and make sure none of them are too similar. (correlating cookies here)

Once I have my design I am happy with, I trace the lines in marker to make them stand out. This way I can see it without the actual cookie shape, just in case there is extra cookie that can distract me, like in this one:

As you can see in a few of the pictures above, I sometimes label the parts with the colors or ideas so I remember later. In the picture below, I labeled it so that the person I made them for could see the design and help me decide which color from their theme should go on which part. (correlating cookies here)

Each set of cookies calls for a different planning process, and most of the time I just make it up as I go. But this is what has been working for me!

5 Comments

Filed under Uncategorized

March 6, 2013 · 8:00 am

Announcement Cookies

I have an announcement…

…but first you have to unscramble my cookies…

…

That’s right, I am expecting!

This is the other reason I have been a little more MIA than usual lately. I have been busy growing a human!

The first couple weeks after I found out I was feeling pretty sick all day. Then suddenly the sickness disappeared and I have just been combating exhaustion now. Some days I am more hormonal and cranky or emotional than others, but all-in-all I have been feeling great!

I am about 10 weeks now, due date is early October. Can’t wait!!

10 Comments

Filed under Cookies

March 4, 2013 · 8:00 am

Blue Bird Cookies for Tea

I recently started a new job. It’s the main reason my posts have been less frequent and erratic. It was a good move for me and offers excellent growth potential and benefits… but I have been and will continue to be working long hours. Somehow I worked 40 hours a week and found time to make all of the treats you have seen over the last (almost) 2 years… now I am working a minimum of 50 hours a week and just can’t seem to keep this blog regular. My apologies friends and family, I hope to find my energy and niche again soon so that I can get back to my passion!

These cookies I made for one of my former coworkers. She was attending a tea and was put in charge of one of the many tables of 8 ladies. Each table was decorated differently, and my coworker’s theme was birds. She decorated the table in black, bright blue, and cream colors. The cookies were made to match!

My only previous experience with birds were these parrot cookies. With those, I had a cartoon character to go with, and I just incorporated ideas from real parrots to get the profile right. With these cookies, I had no image to start with, and couldn’t find a similar shaped cookie from which to draw inspiration. I struggled with the sketch but eventually landed on something that was doable. I was actually pretty happy with how they turned out.