Baking Shenanigans 2015...

So far, this year has been insanely busy on the baking front. I did have a few weeks in January to recover from the holidays, but I still got to bake up some pretty fun stuff.

1. First birthday cookies in pink and gold.
2. 6th birthday bowling themed cookies.
3. Norman North semi formal invite cookies.
4. Frozen themed birthday cake.
5. Frozen themed birthday cookies.
6. Matilda Jane open house cookies.
7. German chocolate cake for my fabulous father-in-law.
8. Birthday cookies for two of my favorite kids' mimi.
9. 60th birthday golf themed cookies.

1. Birthday cupcakes cookies with polka dots.
2. Personalized valentines cookies.
3. Thank you cookies for nurses.
4. Burger cupcakes and love cookies for Josh's cousin Jennifer's wedding shower.
5. More birthday cupcakes with polka dots.
6. Elephant baby shower cookies.
7. Valentine cookies!
8. Wedding shower cookies.
9. Grey and yellow chevron birthday cupcake cookies.

1. Fire truck themed 3rd birthday cookies.
2. 50 Shades of Grey birthday sugar cookies.
3. Winnie the Pooh birthday sugar cookies.
4. My favorite Frozen sugar cookies so far.
5. Ninjago birthday cookies for my nephew Haden, and Japanese cookies that say Paige for my niece's 16th birthday.
6. Cookies I donated for a local church.
7. Cookies for my friend Kristy who headed to Arizona for a marathon.
8. Wedding shower cookies, love the white on white.
9. My biggest order to date, cookies for the OU College of Arts & Science's gala.

This is not everything that has been happening this year, but it's a lot of it. It hasn't been too easy keeping up with all of it, but it has sure been fun making goodies. I am glad to have a few days to catch my breath and catch up on my DVR and get a little blogging done. I promised my girls that I would make them some chocolate chip cookies this weekend. They have been feeling a little neglected lately.

I am looking forward to what is coming up for March. 

How About Some Goals…

So I don’t believe in New Year’s Resolutions. I think they are silly and people don’t stick to them. I think if you want to do something you should set goals. Small steps in the right direction are more apt to get you where you want to go than a New Year’s Resolution.

I have considered my goals for the year, but I thought I would focus more on monthly goals for now.
Here’s what I have come up with so far, they cover a range of shenanigans.

• On the running front, how about I start running again? My total of 9 whole miles run in December might seem impressive, but I’m ready to start hitting the streets again. So far, so good. I am focusing on running because it’s fun, not because I have to. Two Saturday’s in a row of 5 miles a piece, a hill workout, and even a not so terrible treadmill workout so far. I’d say I’m off to a pretty good start.
• Running naked. Yep, for the entire month of January my goal is to run sans Garmin. I do not want to worry about pace AT ALL for at least one month. (I will reassess this goal for February when February gets here.) This is not to say that I am not keeping track of my miles, but I know most of the routes we run so I can keep track of my distance but not care about how fast I get from the start to the finish.
• As for meal planning, I plan to do it. December was especially hectic with all the baking, and I feel like we were always scrambling for what we were going to have for dinner. Now we talk about it, or we have for the last two weeks, and we have a list of dinner options on the fridge and the girls get to pick.
• January has been much less busy on the baking front, but my goal for this month is marketing, marketing, marketing. I’ve baked up a couple of batches of cookies to take to my favorite salon for passing out. Valentine’s day is right around the corner!

• I also plan to get more organized with my business. (Set up my LLC, and open a business account.) There I sais it, so I have to do it. I have the forms for the LLC in my in box, just have to do it.
• I am so excited that I actually bought a new, to me, fancy camera last week. It’s a Nikon D3000, and my first goal with it is to learn how to use it. I signed up for a photography class, and since I missed the first class last week I am going to night for the make up class. Should be interesting.
• Finally, my last goal for January is to get more yoga back in my life. When I PR’d the marathon, almost two years ago, I was practicing yoga pretty regularly. In fact, all I was doing at that time was running and yoga. No strength or anything. After the horrible miles of 2014, I realized that the thing that was missing for almost the entire year was yoga. I am working on getting back to my mat. It’s good for me and I really enjoy it. It’s practically a no brainer.

Baking in 2014...

This has been a big year for me when it comes to baking. Back in January I was thinking that I would be done with baking, but then February rolled around and after an order for 100 Valentine sugar cookies it has just taken off from there. We have also learned what happens to Penny when she eats a dozen sugar cookies. She is okay for the first 24 hours, but after that it's gas and discomfort for Crazy Penny.

There was a little re-branding, with my new name and logo. It was not easy coming up with my new name, Sugar Shenanigans, I really feel like I have grown into my new name. (Plus I LOVE the word shenanigans.)

We have slowly turned out breakfast nook into my baking area.

I now own two Kitchen aid mixers.

I am the proud owner of a bun rack. Really, it makes me laugh every time I say it. I wonder if that will wear off.

These are just a few the Shenanigans of 2014...

1. Olaf/Frozen cookies for Avery
2. Sock Monkey cookies, I am sad I didn't make these for Carson when she was younger.
3. Love and Dragon Flies for Dan & Judy's anniversary
4. Ice Cream and Cupcakes
5. Flowers, and the first cookies I sent in the mail.
6. Ladybugs, Cows and love.
7. Pokemon for my girls' birthday.
8. Dr. Seuss cookies, I can't wait to make more of these.
9. Peeps! Way better than actual Peeps, in my opinion.

1. Superhero cookies for a 3-year-old's birthday
2. More love cookies for an engagement party.
3. Christmas, Christmas, Christmas!
4. Angels and gold starts. I really love these angels.
5. Arkansas cookies, I love the hog cookies. I made OU, OSU and WVU cookies too.
6. Elf on a Shelf. My kids missed the whole elf on the shelf craze, and I was nervous about these cookies, but they turned out great.
7. Thanksgiving. Love the turkeys made with flower cookie cutters.
8. Music theme cookies.
9. Pigeon cookies, my kids are too old for this character, but I hear the books are very popular. These cookies were a big hit with the kindergarten class.

There have also been a few cakes and cupcakes sprinkled in here and there.

German chocolate cake for my father-in-law's birthday. Seriously, I think I used up every dish in my kitchen with this one.

Dark chocolate nutella cake for my mother-in-law's birthday. (I see a theme developing here.)

I have tried out some new things this year. I aspire to make macaroons. I did make one batch and I think they turned out good.

I think the theme is chocolate and not in-laws.

It's been a year full of baking, and I hope that 2015 brings even more.

A Little Shenanigans...

I feel like I have been baking non-stop lately! That is not complaining at all, but I have been super busy. I thought I would take a break from running and show off some of the cookies I have been baking up...

There have been lots of football cookies, including OSU (gasp!), WVU and Arkansas. I will be sad to see football season go.

I love cupcakes, and I especially love cupcake sugar cookies!

Sometimes the design I have in my head doesn't actually translate in reality, and the cookies I made before these roses are definitely in that category. Multiple cookie cutters to get the shape I wanted made these not the easiest cookies I have made, but they sure turned out cute.

Custom cookies for a shower. I was so happy with how these turned out. I always say I am not very artistic, but I was amazed that I could take an invitation and get parts of it to translate into a cookie. Not the easiest to make, but the end product was one I was very happy with.

The horse shoes on these cookies were royal icing transfers that I made myself. Another pat myself on the back moment. I had to make them a little shimmery with gold edible dust, they were for a little girl's birthday party after all.

October is breast cancer awareness month, and I was super excited when my older sister asked me to make cookies to go along with her Halloween costume. Here theme was "Fight Like a Girl" and she gave out these individually wrapped goodies.

Lastly, for today, it is always someone's birthday, right? These were last minute cookies done for a birthday. I am a big fan of sugar cookies to celebrate birthdays. Okay, to celebrate any day, really.

 

 

So that's just a bit of what has been happening in my kitchen lately. I am hoping to find more time to blog about all the shenanigans. (I really love the word Shenanigans!)