Sharing my journey as a mother, wife, homemaker, Jesus girl, entrepreneur and all things in between!
As you all know, I love me some custom sugar cookies! It’s been a while since I have shared any here on the blog, but my little side gig is still going strong!
One of my very sweetest friends reached out to me a couple of weeks ago, asking if I could help come up with some cookies to announce the gender of their second rainbow baby! I jumped at the chance, and was so excited to try out these fun break apart gender reveal cookies! Of course, if you are not inclined to baking, I am MORE than happy to make a set for you! (Email me 😉 or Facebook me! ), but I thought for my fellow creatives, it would be fun to drop a little DIY tutorial here for you! If you try them out, make sure you post and tag me on Insta!
First, you will need to make up a batch of my No spread Sugar Cookie Dough and a batch of my Royal Icing! Make your icing thick enough that when you run a knife through it, it takes about 10-15 seconds for your line to disappear.
Then you will want to roll out your dough. I use this adjustable rolling pin to make sure my dough is always the same thickness, and I go with the second thickness…whatever that is! (hah! Sorry. I always forget which exact number it is!). Cut out 3 onesie shapes (See above for the links) for every break apart cookie that you want to have.
After you cut and transfer your onesies to the pan- but before you put them in the oven- take the smallest plaque cookie cutter and make a cut out of the middle of 1/3 of your onesies.
Bake them as usual and allow them to cool fully. Be super careful removing the ones with holes from the pan, as they will be a bit fragile!
While your cookies cool, bag up some of your white icing and get your sprinkles ready!
Apply a thin border of icing around the outer edges. I actually put a bit more icing than I needed to on this one, so do as I say and not as I do!
Place one of your “hole” cookies on top, like this, and allow it to dry before moving on! (Now would be a good time to work through the rest of your batch, repeating these steps!)
As soon as your icing is dry, you can fill with sprinkles!
Apply another thin outline of icing and lay your top cookie over the hole. Repeat for all of your cookies and allow these to dry!
If your icing was on the thicker side, thin it a bit so that your line disappears after about 10 seconds. Outline and flood the tops of all of your onesie cookies and place them in front of a fan to dry! I let mine dry overnight.
From here on, it’s up to you what you put on the front! I chose to do “He or She?” using thick royal icing (it shouldn’t bounce back at all when you drag a knife through it!) and an edible marker.
Once you have added your decoration, use thick white icing to add details to your onesie if you want! I think it creates a more finished look, but I have seen people skip this step.
Allow these to dry and that’s it!
My friend wanted a few extra cookies in the “Muffins and coffee” theme for her family to enjoy after breaking the news!
She sent me this picture from their announcement! A fun little piñata of happy!
I did something brave this week.
It wasn’t easy to do. It made me feel silly and nervous and like a failure.
But you see, after 5 months of trying to hold it all together and pretend that things were much smoother this time around, I hit a wall this week.
A week that followed a series of weeks, stuck in quarantine and away from my family (ahem- help, free baby sitting, a break, whatever you want to call it).
A string of weeks where laundry piles have been never ending. I finally get a load folded and put away, only to replace it with the next load of thousands of tiny pieces of laundry needing to be folded. (Which the toddler promptly scattered about the living area)
A string of weeks where I realize as I am cooking dinner, that I am still in my pajamas and haven’t washed my face. Not in like…a cute “PJs all day” kind of way. Like in a “I’m a mess” sort of way.
A string of weeks where I struggled to get a single blog post written, deal posted in my deal group, a huge backlog of people requesting me to find things for them…my work list could go on.
A string of weeks where I realized I hadn’t sent a ministry partner update in two months. That’s a long time y’all! Not to mention the women I have failed to check in on.
A string of weeks where my baking orders made my kitchen look like a bomb went off. And I just didn’t have the energy to fix it.
A string of weeks where the 4 month old wouldn’t sleep unless she was touching me. And even then sometimes wouldn’t. Where we gave up and started bed sharing, despite my will to not do that this time around. Where the two year old woke up constantly at all hours of the night crying for us.
A string of weeks where I haven’t gotten any one on one time with my husband, because typically the only time he isn’t busy, he’s helping me with the kids or I am trying to get the baby to sleep.
A string of weeks where I have had virtually no quiet time to sit with Jesus and fill up my cup.
And do any of these feelings mean I love my family any less?? Of course not! But there is only so much “feeling like a failure” that a person can take.
As I sat, frustrated with my baby for not doing what I wanted her to do…I had a realization. My postpartum depression is rearing it’s ugly head. As much as I don’t want to admit it, my short fuse with my family would say otherwise. And the most loving thing that I can do for my kids is to give them the mama they deserve and get help.
So I reached out. I talked to my nurse and then spent 20 minutes on the phone with my OB. We set up a treatment plan. I picked up a prescription. There is ZERO shame in this!
I share this really raw moment, mama, to encourage you. I know I am not alone. And I know that even if you aren’t in the postpartum depression stage (your kids may be teenagers!). This season is hard, y’all. Things are weird. The world is weird.
If you feel off, talk to someone. Get help. There is NO shame! We are all in this together! I’d much rather you inbox me than go it alone.