The Twelve Days of Cookies Project, Eleven Pipers Piping

December 11, 2012 | 24 Comments »
If I had a long lost twin sister, I am pretty sure it would be Georgeanne.  Except that she is blondish and my hair is dark, and she’s pretty skinny and I’m a little more “substantial”, and she’s brave and I’m, well, a weenie…and she goes white water rafting for fun and the only time I might ever go rafting would be if it was to save my life or the lives of my children.
Okay, so maybe twin was the wrong word.  But some way, somehow, we have some sort of weird mind meld thing going on.  Maybe it’s all the Star Trek we watch.  Anywho, mind melding or not, Georgeanne consistently inspires me with her creative cookie creations.
So here today, with her adorable interpretation of eleven pipers piping is the one and only Lila Loa!
Penguin Pipers -- LilaLoa
If you were to read a history book of my entire life, you would probably hear a lot about cookies, and my family, and some things about South Korea, but you would never read, “And then she sang the entire 12 Days of Christmas song from start to finish.” Mostly because I’ve never even thought the entire song, much less sung it. But also because there isn’t actually a history book of my life, much to my intense personal relief, you can be sure of that. See, I usually give up on the song somewhere around 5 Gold Rings. I just don’t have that kind of attention span. But since this is The Year of the Twelve Days of Christmas, I am making an exception. Again. For Callye. Whom I adore. And for all of you. Because Callye adores you.
11 Pipers Piping (2) - LilaLoa
First, you need to get the shape. I hope you didn’t put away your bell cutters after making Sarah’s Dancing Ladies cookies. Grab one of the larger bells and cut out a cookie. Flip your cutter upside down and cut the shape again. This leaves you with a knobby little oval. And for this cookie, that’s a good thing.
11 Pipers -LilaLoa
1. Outline and fill the bottom half of the cookie. You can make the top line crooked if you want to. Let it dry for 30 minutes or so.
2. Outline and fill the top half of the cookie with light blue icing. Add some little dots of white icing while the blue is still wet. They are supposed to look like snow. You can leave that out if you want. Also… I thought it would be a great idea to add some sanding sugar at this point to also look like snow.  You shouldn’t do that because as it turns out that was actually a bad idea. When I piped black icing on top of it…. it got all weird. You’ll see. Anyway, let the blue and white dry for another couple of hours.
3. This is really the only tricky step in the whole process. Pipe the white part of the penguin using 20 count royal icing and a #2 tip. Start at the top and make a heart shape for the head. Then add a piece of pie on the bottom. Hmm. I guess the cookie isn’t so tricky after all. Let the white dry for a few hours again.
4. Use a #3 tip to pipe a black line around the bottom half of the penguin and then round out the head. Let it dry overnight.
11 Pipers (4) - LilaLoa
5.  Use a #3 tip and 20 count royal icing to make some white dots where the eyes will go. Immediately come back and drop some black icing in the middle using a #3 tip. Let those dry for 14 minutes before moving on.
6. Using orange icing and a #1.5 tip, add a little diamond for a nose and some round little feet.  (PS — See how the sanding sugar around the penguin absorbed the black food coloring? Yeah, let’s not do that again.)
7. Give your penguin a little hat with red icing and a #1.5 tip. Outline the hat on the blue icing first, and then fill in the rest on top of the black icing head. (I might be losing my mind, because I honestly cannot think of a less confusing way to say that.) Grab another #1.5 tip and some gray icing to make his little musical instrument. Let it dry while you take 15 minutes to try and understand what I was really saying up there.
8. Give the hat a little pom on top using a #1.5 tip and some thick green icing. Pipe some fringe on the bottom of the hat while you are at it. Using your black icing again, give the penguin some arms. Let it all dry for a few more hours before finishing up with the details.
11 Pipers (5) - LilaLoa
I used black icing and a #1.5 tip to add some keys to the pipe and then used a black marker to make zig-zaggy lines on the hat. You could probably just use a marker for both of those things. Oh, and the musical notes. I also used a #1.5 tip to add some accent dots and dashes along the bottom left side. It was feeling left out and under appreciated.
11 Pipers 1 - LilaLoa
That’s pretty much it. I don’t actually have anything else to say. But it’s kind of fun just being here. I don’t really want to go. I think I’ll just hide. Shhh…. don’t tell Callye.
While Georganne’s off hiding in the closet, be sure to check out all of the other amazing cookie creations!
Animal Cookies, Christmas Cookies, Cookies, Creative Use of Cutters, Guest Tutorials, Holiday Cookies, Seasonal Cookies, Sweet Sugar Belle, Tutorials, Winter Cookies
24 Comments »