our official cookie bake day 2009

Our annual Bake Day is one of my favorite holiday traditions. I think it ties with our Baby Jesus Cake for most favorite tradition. Beware there is an obscene number of photos to document 2 hours of oOeY gOOey MeSSy fUn. Which reminds me of this little gem: I will fully admit that I picked up this book at Target for the adorable cover. I have yet to try out the recipes, but isn't that cover adorable??? I redesigned by little baking corner of the kitchen counter to take full advantage of this book's cuteness and the fun glass jars some sneaky elves got me for Christmas! (pics of that soon)

Pre-Baking we took this "official photo". You can't tell Grace is excited or anything, right? Now, Bake Day is a girls-only event, but who can resist that adorable little fella??? Not me!

Selecting your cookie cutters is serious business, you know? Finally! A gingerbread man wins the coveted spot for first cookie {Can you see the little pout? Grace was not too happy that we didn't have a gingerbread girl} - my lil' pumpkin princess, how I love you! Ready to get this show going! But wait. Heart shaped cookie cutters spotted. I spy trouble ahead for Mr. Gingerbread Man. All month we've been talking about Baby Jesus and his birthday and making him a birthday cake and as we're about to mix the dough, Grace says, "Next morning (meaning tomorrow) mama, I want to make heart ones for Baby Jesus' birthday" {melt my heart in one big swoop little one! tears are not supposed to be a part of Bake Day!} Mix, mix, mix... And fluff, fluff, fluff... A little too much fluffing and patting - flour was flying EVERYWHERE so we decided we better tie one on (an apron, that is :) I should've thought ahead and had matching ones or something, but oh, well I just grabbed the first ones I could find and that's why mine is an old one from an event I helped organize. Remember, "wiggle, wiggle, wiggle", well, this was, "pat, pat, pat, CLAP!" followed by flour flying everywhere! Such fun memories! I treasure moments like this. Time to roll, roll, roll... And then Grace decided we should all "play the drums" and CLAP! with our cookie dough! Fun times. Little hands busy at work. I cannot even begin to tell you how much I love this picture! We couldn't resist opening up the doors to this Girls Club for a certain sweet little rollie pollie! The shiny Gingerbread Man reaffirmed his noble position as first cookie cutter by a very unbiased source. Then Grace decided we didn't need cookie cutters after all - Hudson's footprints would make much better imprints! {Don't worry, we were very selective with our cookie recipients!} A few more cut outs... and then it was time to transfer our prized creations. Taking a little break while waiting on mama to finish the icing. Can I just say that even though I followed the directions to a T, our Royal Icing tasted YUK! Thank goodness for a can of cream cheese frosting in the pantry!

Time to decorate!!! {As you can see, that heart cookie for Jesus won out for first place and we had to use PINK frosting of course!} Sprinkle Time!!! Concentrating sooooooo hard on making that frosting come out! There. The old stand-by ziploc bag works much better. I love her excitement. Checking out the officially named "Grace & Noonie's Wiggly Tree" masterpiece! Bake Day is a HUGE MESS! But I wouldn't trade those ooey gooey memories for anything in this world! Go ahead, make a mess.
Your heart will thank you!