Cookie Con Classes!!!

March 14, 2018 | The Cookie Architect

Cookie Con Registration starts TONIGHT at 9:00 pm Eastern time!

When the magic clock strikes the time, a big registration button should appear at the Cookie Con website: Here.

The Cookie Con is such a great event! I’ve been to the last three and had a blast each time! The key is to just give big hugs to everyone- at least, that’s my theory. At any rate, last year I was a presenter, which meant that I taught a class during the main event line up on Friday. But there are also cookie classes available before the Con officially starts, on Wednesday and Thursday. I’ll be teaching classes in this capacity this year. I hope that I’ll fill them up and we can all have a blast together! See the class descriptions below, and also see all the other great options at the Cookie Con website.

Offered in the am session both Wednesday and Thursday-

Cookie Construction: We will be learning how to put cookies together so they fit perfectly. Whether it is fitting together a cookie puzzle or array, or building a three dimensional centerpiece or gingerbread house, we will be filling our tool belts with the tricks and tools needed to construct with cookies! Recipes, baking tips, and assembly will all be covered, and there will be a challenging three dimensional cookie project to decorate and put together during the class! Materials will be provided.

Offered in the pm session Weds. and Thursday-

Advanced Cookie Design: Ready to take your skills to over the top? I’ll share with you my techniques and a few different ways to plan out a very complicated or art type set. Whether it’s a set for a big gift, or a set to challenge yourself, I’ll build up your skills AND your confidence so that you too can stay up late, I mean, soar to the next level! Be prepared to do a little on the fly designing, and projects and problems are welcome, we’ll discuss. Note that this is a design seminar, and we will not be decorating cookies during the session. This class will include some pre-Cookie Con teaching via the internet, for those so inclined, and will be tailored to the needs and questions of those that register.

Cosmopolitan Tea Party

December 6, 2015December 6, 2015 | The Cookie Architect

I know, I know, Christmas is in three weeks. I am excited about it too! But before we dive in to the red and green stuff too much, I have some collaboration projects to share with you that have been in the works since Cookie Con, back in September!

At Cookie Con, Team Cookie (That’s me with the incomparable Kari of Yankee Girl Yummies and Melissa of Melissa Joy Fanciful Cookies) taught a couple of design classes. In those classes, we started out sharing some basics of design and inspiration, and then each of us shared our design and cookie process, to show how you can start from an inspiration and make it your own, and go your own way with it. THEN, we asked the class participants to come up with a theme from an inspiration board, and from there brainstorm how to design a set from that. Each class had been part of a their own group Pinterest board before Cookie Con, and had all pitched in to pin ideas that appealed to them, so that we had a board to look at in the class. Both boards were a cool reflection of their participants, so each had a different vibe. Here is a sampling of the board from our first class:

The board had lots of ladies in cute skirts, lots of nature, tons of flowers, shoes and fashion shots. We wanted to come up with a theme that might actually happen, one where bringing decorated cookies would be just the perfect thing. With all the images we were looking at, we came up with a very fancy tea party, like if the women from Sex and the City decided to throw a tea party at the Four Seasons. Our Cosmopolitan Tea Party Set, as we designed it in our class, included fashionable ladies for every seasons, tea cups with natural elements, shoes with flowers and plants (or even made of plants). We explored how we might pick cutters for those cookies, and different ways to organize a set, from a big platter to personalized name card cookies. I hope the participants in class had as much fun as Team Cookie did, because we had a blast!

After the class, we offered them the challenge of taking our starting place, the theme and the inspiration of the Cosmopolitan Tea Party and going through the process on their own to come up with some actual cookies! In the end, it was too much for many busy cookiers to take on at this time of year, but we did have one game participant, Beth of Love Bug Cakes and Cookies! We loved the overall set, it’s so great!!! Some of our favorite details are how she used a uniform cookie for the ladies, but mixed it up with the composition so that they are all very dynamic. Also, great use of design to solve the age old “face” problem. Don’t want to worry about the face? Just choose a different angle! The colors hold together well, but you can still pick out the four seasons. And, she also managed to use the plaque cutter that we gave out in class- which was generously donated by Truly Mad Plastics. Thank you Beth for contributing!

Some of Beth’s classmate’s have said they will participate in the New Year when they have more time, so if that is the case, you can look forward to me sharing those with you too when they are ready!

In the meantime, each of us on Team Cookie also did our take on the theme. Similar to the examples we used in the class, you will see how three different designers can take their needs, style, and skill and do three very different sets of cookies!

Let me first show you Kari of Yankee Girl Yummies‘ set. I have been dying to share this with you guys since I first say it. It took my breath away. It’s a smaller vignette than Beth’s but how evocative of nature, of elegance and sophistication. I, for one, am smitten! That lady in the wind is so gorgeous!!! And on a lighter note, that tea bag, I have it on good authority, is wafer paper filled with chocolate jimmies. Perfect for your cookies and ice cream treat. 😉

Melissa of Melissa Joy Fanciful Cookies did a set that is perfect for getting glamour and simplicity together at the same party! Which is her specialty, right? A platter inspired by some of the nature/fashion images from the Pinterest board, and perfect for that Fall tea party, or book club, or fashion show! What a sweet girl, and the colors and shapes for the leaf skirt are perfection. One of the fun things about the class was showing that it doesn’t always have to be fancy or handpainted to be a gorgeous and clever design!

Last but hopefully not least, here is the set of cookies I was inspired to make! I saw a cute little drawing of a girl with a teacup skirt and thought that would be a fun way to do a tea party set for fashionable ladies, and it would be fun to think about what makes tea so great year round. I was also inspired by fashion sketches, wanting to keep the backgrounds very clean and bright. And in keeping with my body positive politics, I decided that I would change up the body shapes of the woman so they weren’t all stick thin. Beauty comes in many shapes and sizes! If you want to see more pictures of these cookies including individual shots, be sure to check out the gallery in my portfolio!

Thank you to everyone who took our class at Cookie Con- we had an absolute blast! And thank you for all who participated in our mini collaborations, Beth, and hopefully in time a few others! And stay tuned too for the other class’s project. It is completely different. Just goes to show you how much fun you can have with creative cookies!

Cookie Con Sugar Show Entry and GIVEAWAY!!! (CLOSED)

October 24, 2015October 28, 2015 | The Cookie Architect

It has been too long everyone. Blogging is hard.And I have been busy! Because did you guys know there really is such a thing as Cookie Con? Yep. It’s real, it happened, and it was a blast. Our Team Cookie classes were a huge success, and will be blogged about I promise- I have a whole list of posts to do. The Classes, the Con, assorted cookies, all sorts of things. Today’s is about my Sugar Show entry from Cookie Con 2015!

Last Cookie Con, I tried to do something in a new style, with my first set of painted Matryoshka dolls. This time, I aimed for something a little more “me.” And what is more me than a coloring page these days? How about a cookie collaboration!! I decided to go something interactive, that I thought would be fun. I designed and drew a coloring page on to a cookie, and then for the Sugar Show at Cookie Con, I put it out with a set of edible food coloring markers, and a little note asking everyone to participate by coloring some of it. And everyone did! What a blast!

Here was the entry as I submitted it to the show. The drawing was an original composition that I drew. I have been grooving on birds, so I decided to do a birds and flowers thing, and a little flower girl snuck in there too. I wanted the pattern I used to be cookie cutter related. Do you guys recognize the cutter shape I used? It’s the Georganne Cutter designed by Lilaloa and sold at Whisked Away Cutters. I’m going to have to see if I can get the complimentary Georganne’s Accomplice cutter made to so I can make a cookie tile pattern!

I did a lot of experimenting to figure out a way to do the line work like I wanted but not have it bleed when the cookie was colored over with marker. I knew that it was probably too ornate of a design for wet on wet, and my early experiments there were a failure anyway. In the end, it turned out that if I used my Rainbow Dust food marker and let it dry, then dusted with cornstarch, and the lines didn’t blur when I scribbled on top of them. Perfect, and easy!

Originally, I had intended for the cookie to be all one piece, but then I decided that it would be harder to transport that way. And in a classic Cookie Architect move, I found myself making a bizarre set of curved puzzle pieces that had to all fit together, and were NOT easier to transport to Salt Lake City. I’m silly. But they did fit together, and they did get to Cookie Con in one piece, so all’s well that ends well.

Watching my plan come together during the convention was definitely the best part! I even made a quick video showing the page getting colored in!

And in the end, it was amazing! And at least 61 people, including a record two (2!!!) MEN helped to color it and make a piece that captured the cookie community spirit that is Cookie Con.

Contributors Included: Bette Wu, John Adams, Rosemarie Carroll, Nikki Krause, Lisa Provenza-Bebar, Robyn Wilson, Andrea Jensen, Lindsey DiLoreto, Lisa Lamb, Lara Parodi, Bobbi Barton, Andrea Young, Melissa Mitchell, Laura Dong, Karine Lemonnier, Kelly Carter, Delorse Sword, Nancy Cavagnaro, Signa Atherton, Susanne Kristine, Janis Nunez, Barbara Newlon, Summer Turner, Jennifer Wallace, Becky Kasten, Josi Dyer, Nicole Hastings, Kimberly Dickerson, Malinda Hollinshead, Sally Koldenhof, Sandy Parkhouse, Sherree Hellinger, Desiree Sedwick, Sandee Moss, Peka Peke, Kathy Pilato, Melissa Murray, Kimberly Damon, Kari Arroyo, Toni Shavers, Josie Felix, Stephanie Organes, Tatiana Khromushina, Lilly Fenton, Ameeta Rajagopal, Cindy Timpone, Karen Summers, Mike Summers, Kendra Player, Claudia Ayala-Frush, Sarah Kluge, Silvia Latour, Brenda Byrne, Belinda Bain, Heather Impson, Katy Metoyer, Dany Lind, Sarah Kersten, Christine Donnelly, Rebecca Weld, and I’m sure others- let me know if you aren’t on the list but helped on the cookie coloring!

So here is the GIVEAWAY part! I am giving away this actual coloring page cookie. And since at this point it is a display piece, I’ll also include a few eating cookies so you can get a taste for some fresh Cookie Architect deliciousness! For a chance to win, all you have to do is comment on this blog post (if the comments option isn’t showing, click on the title to “enter” the blog post instead of the page stream). In the comments, I’d be curious to know which of the styles I’ve worked in is your favorite(or which of my cookie sets), and/or what you’d like to see me work on next! Giveaway will end Tuesday at 8:00pm EST. US and Canadian mailing addresses only- others can win for a friend! (Congratulations to the winner- Trisha M.!!)

And last but not least- I promised you a treat, and that treat is that I went ahead and made my coloring page cookie design into a real printable coloring page! You can download it by clicking here. If you color it, please share! I’d love to see it!! And be sure to check out my other coloring pages here on the blog!

Team Cookie: Cookie Con Design Seminar EDIT: CLASS FULL

February 19, 2015April 1, 2015 | The Cookie Architect

I can’t tell you how excited and honored I am to be part of the next Cookie Con, taking place in September 2015 in Salt Lake City. I went last year and couldn’t have had more fun meeting all my cookie friends and checking out the cookie happenings! Last year, there were only class offerings during the regular Cookie Con schedule, but this time, they have extended the time a bit to allow people to sign up for some more advanced smaller cookie classes! Myself, I am teaming up with two of my best cookie partners-in-crime, Kari of Yankee Girl Yummies and Melissa of Melissa Joy Custom Cookies, to offer some classes that we really hope that you will be interested in! Read on to find out all about it.

Cookie Design Seminar

(September 23rd and 24th, 2015)

Have you ever wondered how to get from the beginning of an idea (or no idea!) to a full fledged cookie set?

How to get from the thought of Nantucket Cookies, to the reality of my Nantucket set?

Or how to go about designing all the details for something like this amazing set by Yankee Girl Yummies?

Or how to proceed from the kid-friendly fun of tic-tac-toe to the genius of Melissa Joy’s cookie tic-tac-toe?

In this two part seminar, our team will show you how we do it! We will give you pointers and experience in cookie design that will have you pulling together cookies like a pro in no time! Read on for all of the class details, but first, let me tell you a little bit more about Team Cookie!

Here we are having a blast at Cookie Con 2014!! We are so excited to do it all again, and meet even more cookie friends!

You all know about me, The Cookie Architect… I’m the brunette in the middle here. So let me introduce you to my friends! The lovely lady on the left (my right haha!) is Melissa “Joy” Lacasse.

Melissa has always had a passion for baking just about anything, but something clicked once she received a cookie decorating kit years ago. Her pastime started as holiday cookies for family and friends, but eventually turned into a small business and Melissa Joy Cookies was born. While Melissa enjoys the creative outlet that cookie decorating brings, she finds that sharing with others, whether via bakery box or virtually, is always the most rewarding part of her journey. Her work can be found on Facebook, Instagram, and her blog, melissajoycookies.com.

Melissa is also a member of #teamallboys, with two school age sons. It is something that I share in common with her, and with the gorgeous girl on the right in this picture, Kari Arroyo of Yankee Girl Yummies!

Kari started decorating cookies four years ago, after deciding to take a break from nursing. She learned the ways of royal icing by reading tutorials and LOTS of trial and error (sound familiar? Me too!!) . There are links to her many cookie decorating tutorials on her website as well as Facebook. When she’s not decorating cookies, you can find her chasing after her two busy boys! Find her at www.facebook.com/YankeeGirlYummies and www.yankeegirlyummies.com

These ladies have been with me since the very beginning of my online cookie journey. Kari was the very first cookie page to “like” my cookie page on Facebook, and Melissa was the very first page to share one of my cookies! They are the best cheerleaders and sounding board a cookier could ask for, and super sharp cookie designers, so I could not be more excited for the class we are teaming up to do together.

So without further ado, here is what we’ve lined up:

Session I: September 23rd

For the first session of our seminar, join our cookie team and design a cookie set right on the spot. That’s right, this cookie design charrette will have us all working together to create a set of cookie designs with the help of a full array of tools and techniques. We’ll share all the secrets of Pinterest, how to use your KK for more than piping, and how to work within design constraints — like pesky client requests 😉 — while getting and staying creative and inspired.

Come tap in to our years of design and art experience, and learn how to design everything from intricate to simple in your own style!

Cost for session $125 per person, (specify Wednesday Morning or Wednesday Afternoon, 12 person limit per section)

Session II: September 24th

Part Two of our seminar happens the next morning. In this session we will be doing some hands on cookie decorating and you will get a chance to be in a smaller group with each of us as individual instructors. Cookies and materials will be provided, and our two design sections will be joined together, so that you will get a chance to meet even more cookie friends! Each of us will work with you for an hour, on a set that will be designed by us to tie together, and hopefully teach you some fun things. We hope to have a little time at the end where we can answer questions as well, and you’ll leave with a tasting sample of our favorite cookie recipes that you’ve decorated, and a few decorating goodies!

The Thursday group decorating seminar will be for both of the Wednesday groups together. It is optional to go on to do it, but it is open first to participants of the Wednesday design seminars. If there is availability, the class will be opened to others as well, for a maximum of 24 (3 groups of 8). Cost for the decorating class is $150.

Now, Cookie Con tickets go on sale March 23rd. The cost of registration is NOT included in the cost of the seminar. Per the request of the Cookie Con organizers, we will be selling tickets starting March 24th, to ensure that all those who sign up for our class are definitely able to come to the event.

To register please email Kari at yankeegirlyummies@gmail.com and give her your name, Paypal email and which sessions you are interested in, and she will put you on the waiting list. On March 24th, we will issue you a Paypal invoice. You will have 48 hrs to reserve your spot by paying your invoice. Then we will move down the list if there are still people waiting!!

REGISTRATION IS NOW CLOSED! Thank you everyone for your interest in our class!

Payment is due at registration. Cancellation is possible prior to July 15^th, all but $15 will be refunded. If you find after July 15^th that you are not able to attend, we will refund your payment (minus $15) only if we are able to fill your spot.

If you have any questions- don’t hesitate to ask me or anyone on the team!

(Click on the blog post title to get to the comment area.)

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