Christmas Sugar Cookies

Happy New Year!

I know that it's after Christmas now, but I'm a little behind in my posts, so I'm showing you iced Christmas sugar cookies. I did these the day before Christmas, then I did some more last week because I loved it so much!

This is the first time I've tried piping icing onto sugar cookies. Do you like them?

In the past, I've frosted with a knife and then put sprinkles on. That is also fun, but I always get a teensy bit bored with it. Piping has seemed too intimidating.

This year, I decided to try it after seeing a wonderful video tutorial on piping lines from Sweetopia. If you haven't heard of this site, you should definitely check it out! I guarantee you will end up spending a lot of time there. Just remember to come back!

Here is a link to the tutorial I mentioned. She makes it look so easy!

Also check out her link to the "10-second rule" to determine if your icing is the right consistency. I've had problems with this in the past and this rule saved me. So simple and it really works!

Here are some close-ups of some of my cookies.

Now these did take a long time to do. I thought it was fun. After awhile, I started to have a problem coming up with new things to do, so I repeated a lot. But I thought they looked really nice when finished. One of my favorite designs was the simple snowflake on the round scalloped-edge cookies.

These weren't just good-looking, they were fantastic to eat too! I used a recipe I found on another blog I love, Sweetapolita. Her blog is also fantastic and you should all definitely check it out. You will love it! Click here for her sugar cookie recipe and instructions for handling the dough. I followed all of these instructions and they worked perfectly. All of the chilling helps the cookies to not spread or lose shape when they are baking. It all makes for a much prettier cookie in the end!

To Sweetapolita's recipe, I added a quarter teaspoon of almond extract. I also used about 5 drops of lemon oil instead of the lemon extract, but only because I already had lemon oil and did not have any lemon extract. The result was delicious! Honestly, I couldn't stop eating them!

I used royal icing leftover from the gingerbread houses (see this previous post). I just added some water to thin it a little and used the "10-second rule," above, to find the right consistency.

I hope you enjoyed seeing my cookies! These would be good for any holiday, just modify the shapes (circles work for everything) and design. So, you can make them now even though Christmas is over! I'd love to see what you come up with and hear how these worked for you!