Thrifty Thursday - Vintage Cookie Cutters from Estate Sales - Elephant Cookie Zebra Cookie, Seal Cookie, Camel Cookie & Alligator Cookie

I used some left-over royal icing to make these animal cookies for my nephew. Please note, the Alligator is completely wrong, I would have added green texture but was completely out of thicker icing and too tired to thicken what I had. Same problem with the seal, I used left-over icing and only had thin flooding icing.

The goal of this project was to see how these cookie cutters would work. I think they are great, and with the right shapes decorating is very easy.

Do you want to know the best part about these cookie cutters? I found them at an estate sale for 10 cents each. I love the simplicity of the lines on these and the size. Just as our portions have grown, so have our cookie cutters!! Some of the animal cutters I have seen online are close to 5 inches! These are perfect, barely three inches.

So go hunt for cookie cutters and estate sales or yard sales, and someday we may share an episode of hoarders.

How to Make a Vintage Toy Drum Cookie

Another, I didn't have that cookie cutter story... this time the request was for a vintage toy drum. I went through some of my easy access cutters and realized the bottom of the rocking horse would give the curved lines I was looking for. I had intended to hand cut them, but after a busy week I looked for a simpler solution. I want to try these again, maybe at Christmas time with bright reds, greens and gold.

For this project I used:

1) Sugar Cookie Dough

2) Rocking Horse Cookie Cutter + Small spatula for cutting the shapes.

3) Royal icing in vintage blue, red and tan. Both thick piping consistency and thinner flooding consistency.

Here is how I cut out the the drum shape. The top and the bottom from the rocking horse and the sides using the small metal spatula. This went fairly quickly. One major mistake - I made this cookie a little too big.
I also used the rocking horse to make "guide lines" for decorating. This made the decorating so much simpler.
Here's how the cookie looked after baking. I have nice lines to help me make the sections of the drum.

To start, make a wide band at the top. I used a Wilton Size 3 tip.

After that I outlined the smaller blue sections and the large red section.

Now fill in the blue section. I tried making the larger bands with all piping consistency but It didn't give the drums the smooth look I wanted. Wait about 20-30 minutes for this to set up before continuing. I must have been pretty tired at this point, I stopped taking pictures.

From here, simply Fill in the top part with tan and the bottom portion with red. When this is dry add the final details. I made the lines with the tan and added more blue lines to add dimension.

When I took the photos all of a sudden the tan turned into a more blush color... hmmm. I need to be more careful mixing colors. It did look a lot better packaged and with the bow.

How to make a Vintage Toy Airplane Cookie

These toy airplane cookies were part of the custom order for a vintage-toy themed baby shower. The order came in with out enough time to order a vintage airplane cookie cutter. My cousin Emma (Click here to see her website) suggested altering the jet airplane cutter that I already have. This cutter is plastic so I had to work with changing around the dough after the shapes were cut. This is still less time than hand cutting each airplane.

For this project I used:

1) airplane cutter + small number 1 cutter

2) sugar cookie dough

3) Royal icing, both thick piping consistency and thinner flood consistency in tan, vintage red and vintage blue. For a good royal icing recipe check out SweetSugarBelle's blog and this post.

I modified the jet airplane shape by making the wings go out to the side and the edges straight. I also used the small number one cutter show for the propeller. In the oven the pieces form together on their own.
When I get to this point I'm so happy, all the hard work is over and the fun begins. I hurt my wrist rolling dough a couple of weeks ago so I only used disposable piping bags. I think I may do this more often. I felt I had better control over the flood icing and I didn't have to squeeze so hard to get the icing out.
Outline the airplanes with the blue piping consistency icing.
Now flood with the thinner icing. I love love love this step. I worked with about 5 cookies at a time for this project. Try to under fill the cookies as you will be adding more details to the wet icing. So many times I fill them too much and there is not room for the wet details. Icing ends up all over the sides of the cookie.

While the icing is still wet add a large red circle. Do this to all five cookies. Nice photo, huh? I really need a robot to help me with my pictures. It's hard to pipe dots and take a picture with a clunky camera.

Gently shake the cookie so the icing flattens out.
While the icing is still wet add the small lines. I wanted them flush with the blue icing. Don't work with too many cookies at a time or you will not get that look. I used a Wilton size 1 tip. Add the red propeller.
Here they are!
I made 20 of these cookies. Figuring out the design was the hardest part. Is that why people get mad when other's copy their designs? Copy away... even with a design to follow this is a lot of work. I bet someone with more cookie experience could even improve this design.
A sample of the cookies for this baby shower.

How to make a Vintage Teddy Bear Cookie

These Teddy Bears were for a "Vintage Toy" themed birthday party. I have a few bear cookie cutters, but they just weren't right. A vintage bear is thin and lanky. I didn't want the traditional chubby bear found in most baby sets. So, I think I should re-name my blog "and I didn't have the cookie cutter" - In this case I made a rough cookie shape and I like the way it turned out, kind of jagged and rustic looking behind the bear.
All dressed and ready to go to the baby shower. Please excuse the photo quality - you can tell this one was taken late late at night. I don't photoshop anything, I just want to give it to you as is. If the photos are getting dark, you'll know I'm up late decorating!

Here's what you will need

1) Sugar cookies baked in a rough outline of the bear (I trace the image onto the back of a paper plate before cutting the dough.)

2) Tan colored royal icing, keep some thick for outlining and thin some for flooding. I mixed a little bit of brown with the icing... For a good royal icing recipe look here.

3) Accent colored thick icing for the bear's bows. I used red (deep pink + tulip red + super red all americolor) and blue (royal blue + black americolor)

4) Piping consistency black icing for the facial details.

5) Not too much time for decorating :) This one is pretty easy.

Outline cookies using an edible ink marker. It is best if the color of the marker blends with the icing color. I used the KopyKake 300xk for this step because this was such a big order. The bear itself would be fairly simple do do with out the projector - lots of simple circle and oval shapes. Now outline the bear with the piping consistency tan icing. I used a Wilton size 2 tip.

Flood in alternating sections. I really wanted the bears appendages to look separate. Allow one section to dry for about 20 minutes before filling in the next area.

At this point I was exhausted and stopped taking pictures. When the face has set (about 30 minutes later) add a small circle for the bear's face and flood that circle. This adds depth to the bears face. I also added detail to the ears and the bow. Pretty easy!
These bears were a favorite of last week's work.
Here are the other cookies for the baby shower. I will post the other tutorials soon.

How to make a Buzz Lightyear Cookie

Buzz Lightyear Cookie

You will need:

1) Image of Buzz to follow

2) Round cookies (I used beeinourbonnets recipe found here)

3) Thicker, piping consistancy black Royal Icing

4) Flood colors, purple, grey, white, blue and skin tone Royal Icing (best royal icing info found here by SweetSugarBelle)

5) Black edible in markers

6) A whole lot of time :/

Outline buzz with the edible ink marker, then pipe outlines in black. I used the kopykake 300xk

Now Flood alternating sections. If you don't wait long enough between sections they will flow together. I was unhappy with his face in these so I just rushed through the flooding.

Add the eyes. Do this when the face is still wet, but there is just barely a skin forming. I waited too long on some and he looks crazy-eyed in a lot of these cookies.

Now keep flooding

Add extra facial features. I decided it didn't look good with black icing so I switched to using a black edible ink marker.

I am Buzz Lightyear - Universe protection

Character Faces are really hard!! I think maybe if I went a little bit bigger I could have had an easier time.

What I learned... don't rush through flooding sections, even if the eyes look crazy. Flood only about 4 faces at a time so there is enough time to add eyes... Don't do this the same weekend as a Hunger Games Premier

How to make Diary of a Wimpy Kid Cookies

I really like how this one came out.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid Cookies, drawn on then outlined with royal icing

My sister Becca is the one that put this cookie in my head. And once I have a cookie in my head I feel all antsy until I get it done. Becca, no more great ideas!! We were talking about how I'm making too many cookies that I like, and not as many that my kids like. We thought of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. I love those books and movies. A kids' first book with some realistic themes.

Here we go... start with Lilaloa's Chocolate cookie recipe, or whatever favorite rolled cookie you prefer. I personally think the chocolate creates a nice framed effect.

Find some rectangular or square cookie cutters and cut your shapes. These are cookies, and we're just going to eat these so don't stress here!

Outline and flood with royal icing. You can find out a lot about this from Sweetsugarbelle. Someday I'll write all about it. Maybe not, she's done such a great job! I use a thin icing for the flooding because I just like a little bit of icing on my cookies.

make the lines

I let these dry about 12 hours before I put the design on. I first used my dough cutter as a ruler and made blue lines for the notebook paper look. Next, I used the Kopykake projector to draw the characters. I really really wish I could draw, I even found some great tutorials by the author of this book on how to draw his characters. I still need a lot of practice so I used the kopykake.

Get out the kopykake 300xk

I used and AmeriColor Gourment Writer to trace under the projector

Are we having fun yet?

I thought they looked great just drawn on, but wanted to see what it would look like if I added royal icing around the lines. Can you even tell a difference? Which do you prefer. Wait, according to my sister Cathy no one reads anymore. Enjoy the photos.

With this cookies the images are just drawn on.

These ones were just drawn on, I think these are great as is, but you don't get the 3-D effect. So now you know how to make a Diary of a Wimpy Kid Cookie. If you don't have the Kopykake just start doodling. These were really really fun. The kids fought over cookie #4. With this cookies the images are just drawn on. If you are going to use black icing please make it a couple days in advanced so it's not super-saturated with dyes.

Batman Cookie with Royal Icing

Batman Cookie on an over-baked Easter egg

This is the last of the super hero cookies. This one was rushed, so it is not perfect. It's okay to blog about the imperfections? The Easter Egg worked fine, although I would like to spend 5.99 and get the exact oval shape for this cookie.

The first flaw, is the over-baking. No big deal because we were doing these just for fun. So don't bake your sugar cookies to this stage, they taste a little off. Kids don't care, but I can tell a difference. It does something to the flavors. Second flaw, we rushed through this and did not give the black enough time to dry. You can see the black is bleeding into the yellow. Third flaw, the small craters on the right side. My theory about craters - under filling and air bubbles. I usually get these in tiny areas where i spread the icing with the toothpick. To avoid this, I would have to carefully pipe the icing into the spaces using a small tip. The lazy way is to just use a toothpick.

Here are all the super hero cookies, Beccacrocker did the Captain America and she was griping about how it turned out. To her defense, she had 13 house guests that weekend, was making homemade pretzels, a cake and lots of food around the clock. It's okay to do these for fun!

All the super hero cookies

Decorated cookies make little kids so happy. Quick Austin, brush your teeth!

Beccacrocker did a really nice off-center batman on a scalloped square cookie. Too bad I didn't get a better picture of it. As always, prepare the royal icing a couple days in advanced so the grey can turn to black and the dark pink can turn red. The same was true with the dark blue.

Superman Cookies with royal icing using Kopykake 300XK

Superman Cookie decorated with Royal Icing

Superman Cookies were really easy to make with the KopyKake. I didn't have a cookie cutter so I found the image, printed it out and cut out the shape using the dough cutter. For info on making a shape with out a cookie cutter look at this post where I made the ballerina cookie shape using clipart.

Piping with my hand at an angle to avoid shadows

I placed the same image into the projector and used it to pipe a black outline. I want everyone to think I'm some great artist but I'm not. I just followed the lines. The image appears slighlty fuzzy and this would not work in bright light. I had to get used to piping at every angle because your hand creates shadows under the projector.

All Done piping lines

Now let the outline dry, for at least 20 minutes, maybe even overnight.

Can someone say storage hazard?? You can see Becca working hard in the corner.

The technology on this thing is a little 1970s, but it works.

Now the fun part, filling in the colors. Do not under fill or you will get craters when it dries. I did not add enough yellow, see below the craters?

I made the red icing two days in advance and patiently waited for the dark pink to turn into red. I started with deep pink and then added Americolor Tulip Red.