Mrs. Bauer's 54 years Cookie

click to enlarge

This one was certainly a last from the past! Out of the blue I received a Facebook message from a girl I used to play volleyball with in high school...this wasn't someone in my grade either this girl was two years younger than me, but waaaaaayyy better than me even when she was a freshman! She went on to play volleyball for Michigan and is a commentator on the Big Ten network! But I digress...she contacted me to make a cookie for her mom's 54th birthday party and we decided to do a 'favorite things' cookie....which is basically what everyone decides to do if they don't come to me with something really specific. That's ok with me...I enjoy the puzzle aspect of fitting all the different ideas together. This one though...this just about hit the limit on the number of things that I can fit on a cookie :)

We touched on just about every aspect of her life from high school, to her sorority, to her favorite places to go in Indiana, and many more...let's not forget her LOVE of shopping!! This is one of those cookies you have to keep looking at to see all the different elements. Even now, I keep scrolling up to look and find something else I forgot I had added on there. If they wanted a cookie that let their mom reflect and remember all the great times and things shes accomplished in her 54 years than this was definitely it!

If I had to do it again, I would have reduced the size of the border on the top as it forces all the elements very tightly together, but I would still keep it as a solid color all the way around as I think it needs something solid in contrast to all the varied designs on the face of the cookie. Also, this picture doesn't capture it at all, but it serves as the perfect background for the border I designed. I don't do it on every cookie, but if I have the option using an element of the design on the border I think it makes the cookie that much more interesting.  For this one, the border is alternating colors of shopping bags with their handles peeking over the edge as you can see a little bit in this image. Being able to bring a design element off the face and around the edge really helps tie the whole cookie design together instead of having a highly relevant design on top and a disconnected generic border. I think that where I am able to make the border really speak to the whole cookie design is where I find some of my most successful cookies.