Lego cookies

I am getting so excited for Lex’s birthday party this year. I hope I manage to get all of my awesome ideas done before the big day… not likely!

Lex decided he wants to bring Lego head cookies to class this year, instead of cupcakes. With inspiration from much fancier bakers than myself, I got brave enough to give it a shot! This project included hand cutting rollout cookies!

hand cutting cookies

I made a template out of a yogurt lid and hand cut the cookies.

hand cut cookies

Two done... many more to go!

I wish I could take the credit for this idea, but of course, I can not. Check out Sweet Sugar Belle for a great tutorial and much fancier photos.

Handing cutting 40 Lego heads and a tray full of squarish and rectangularish shapes took awhile, but it was worth it! They looked a little odd at first…

baked cookies

All baked, bare and ready for frosting! I could have measured those bricks and made them even and straight edged, but I did not.

cookies

These could be robot heads too! I'll have to save this template. :)

but once I started decorating them… so cute!

decorated

Decorated!

cookies

I was going to be all fancy and find a bunch of Lego faces to copy, but as usual I got lazy and just winged it! Lex helped me think of face ideas. Some came out better than others, but overall I LOVE them!

decorating with marshmallows

We used halved mini-marshmallows for the Lego "bumps" on the squares and rectangles. The kids cut them and put them on the cookies for me.

eating the marshmallows

I'd like to say they ate the marshmallows for me too, but of course I ate my fair share as well! :)

messy blocks

These were super messy! In hindsight I should have skipped the marshmallows, flooded the cookies, then pressed on M&Ms in corresponding colors. That would have looked better and been MUCH easier. Oh well. Next time, right?

more mess

The icing actually settled well and they came out looking pretty good, if you just ignore all the extra icing hanging down the edges. :) I'm sure they will taste just fine!

Far from perfect, but Lex was thrilled and I think his fellow first graders will be equally happy with these.

bagged up

I decided to wrap them individually. This made it easier to put them away (get them off my table before we ate them all!) and I think it will be easier for Lex to manage in school. We're sending in a few extras too, so he can deliver them to other teachers or staff if he wants.

all boxed up

All boxed up and ready to go! This makes me happy. :)

I was crafting a post in my head about “good enough” baking, instead of awesome baking like this, and this, and this. I used to have these blogs in my feed reader, but I had to remove them because I really don’t need a daily dose of adorably decorated sugar cookie inspiration. I really need some “get up and go” inspiration, not “break out the confectioner sugar” inspiration! I decided that “good enough” baking is good enough for me! As long as my “clients” are adorable children then I will better serve them with extra attention and “good enough” baking, instead of no attention and perfect baking!

Stay tuned for my awesome “good enough” cakes! One triple layer and one Lego cake. Bake on!

Lego madness – the complete story

You all remember our lego pile, right? Fifteen gallons of 30 year old legos, resurrected for another generation of fun. Of course we’ve added our fair share over the years.

They have been part of our toy collection for two years (almost to the day!) and it took Aunt Joyce about one day to decide to organize them. I’ve asked Lex many times if we could sort and organize them and he always says no, but when Joyce asks it’s a different story! :) Not only did she ask, but she did most of the work!

j1

Look at her go! Helpfulness, military precision, or just OCD?

 

j2

While the rest of us watched TV Joyce kept at it.

The next day (wait, that was just today!) we went out to breakfast with the family then stopped at Big K to find some organizational solution. We joked about just grabbing all four corners of the sheet and plopping it back in the big bucket, but I think Joyce may have kicked our butts! And we all know she could! So we bought some plastic buckets instead and went to work.

all1

Everyone (but me) hard at work!

 

all2

Making progress...

 

j3

Where did everyone go? One by one we trickled away...

 

j4

But not Joyce. She persevered!

 

happy boy

Lex is pretty happy about the new solution. The legos stayed packed up for the duration of quiet time...

 

legos

Then right back out again!