I remember when I was young, my mom did A LOT of baking around the holidays and even for Valentine’s Day we made cookies or cupcakes to share with friends. I enjoyed doing it with my mom then, but now I would just rather be the decorator, not the baker. It’s probably more of a time thing. I feel like I don’t have time to enjoy cooking. Maybe when my kids are grown up and gone I will enjoy it more. I don’t know.
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I’ve never been able to master the sugar cookie, especially decorating them and I was excited when my sister in law called me up and asked if I would like to join her in learning how to decorate some darling Valentine cookies. Being the lover of any kind of craft, I have attempted cake decorating before and would LOVE to learn more, but I’ve never tried real cookie decorating. The closest I’ve gotten is spreading some Betty Crocker, pink icing on a cookie that looks like a lumpy circle rather than a heart. My shapes never come out right with sugar cookies either. Taking this class gave me hope that maybe I can do this! THESE ARE THE COOOKIES I DECORATED!! Pretty cool, if I say so myself.
**I was given a small discount in exchange for sharing my experience. All thoughts and opinions are my own**
Natalie with Sweet Shop Natalie started in 2011 playing around with cookie decorating as a hobby, making cookies for her niece’s and nephew’s birthdays (37 nieces and nephews so she has had lots of practice). She started blogging to record all she was learning and making. She was getting so many compliments and people began asking her if they could order cookies and sweets. Two years later in 2013 she started a business. She is a Certified Home Cottage Kitchen and now sells to the public.
Natalie has done a handful of segments on channel 13 news and on studio 5. If you want to get an idea of different things you can learn from her watch a few HERE.
The class I took was a 3 hr class in her home. She does classes at Bakers C&C as well.
I never realized the time that goes into cookies like this. You have to bake the cookies…wait for cookies to cool…make the frosting…decorate… let frosting dry… and often decorate again. It can quickly become an all day afair depending on the cookie. Luckily she had the cookies already made for us to start decorating. 
We were given a copy of the recipes used for the cookies and frosting we were making. Those recipes are on her blog HERE. It was nice to take notes as she talked about her recipes as well. She also shared some other great cookie blogger websites and gave us a list of local decorating supply stores and online supply shops.
She showed us how to make frosting good for anything from roses and text to flooding and dipping. There are 5 different consistencies when using royal icing. She also gave us a chart showing how to get certain colors by mixing different colors together into the frosting. We practiced piping the frosting onto a sheet first before piping on the cookie.
Natalie introduced us to many different tools she uses to get perfect thickness of cookies and also to get the amazing looks on her cookies. Check out this rolling pin! Who knew you could have a rolling pin that measures thickness?
We used stencils and airbrushed then sprayed with edible glitter…yes, you can airbrush cookies!! 
We used a projector that hooked up to her phone so that we could trace a word onto a cookie.
We also painted parts of the cookie to get a beautiful gold color with edible food paint. That heart cookie with all the lines accross…the gold line is painted with a special edible paint. So cool! And to finish off the X and O we learned how to make the flowers.
All in all, I really liked the class. I wish it had been on a day that I didn’t have other things I was coming from and going to so that I could enjoy it completely without feeling rushed. (I came straight from a baby shower before the class, and my son was singing the National Anthem at the Salt Lake City Stars basketball game with his choir shortly after so I had to rush off …yes, this is my life). But I got to spend some fun crafting time with my sister in law where someone else set it all up and took it all down. SCORE!
It was really great to have Natalie there to give us tips on how to get things right (angles to hold the decorating bag, feel the different consistencies of frosting, etc) and to use her tools. She even sent us away with a goodie bag with some frosting bags, cookie cutters, and some fun sprinkles.
Taking a class like this can be just for fun or it can help you know if it’s something you would like to get into before you spend all kids of money on tools and products. In our class there was a mom and daughter who seemed to be taking it just for fun and there was even a lady in the class who was a cake decorator and wanted to learn more about royal icing and some new techniques that she hadn’t done on cakes. So many can benefit from the class. It would even be a great gift to give someone, husband’s could get it for wives for Valentine’s Day- just sayin’.
The next class she’s teaching is on March 19th at 6pm, making some Easter cookies. I believe it’s at Bakers C&C in Murray Ut, but don’t quote me on that. Details are coming soon on her sight. You can reserve a spot HERE.
There are so many fun hobbies to be had. What is something you want to try?
SEE THE HAPPY
What an amazing way to decorate! I had no idea there were so many different methods they use! If I tried this Im sure my cookies would turn out to be a hot mess!
With the right tools it’s easier than you think. I bet you could totally do this. Maybe we could take a class together sometime.