When life hands you lemons . . .

 

Make LEMON COOKIES!

You thought I was going to say “lemonade,” didn’t you? Well . . . go ahead and make lemonade, too, if you want to. I won’t judge.

Summer is almost over, and that makes me kind of sad.  Lately, I’ve been trying to come up with cookie ideas that, to me, say “SUMMER IS FOREVER!”  OK. That’s corny. But you know what I mean– I like to squeeze every last bit of summer fun out of the season before it gets colder.

What are we waiting for?  Let’s do this!

Photo by Jill Lang
There’s nothing better than lemonade cookies . . . unless it’s making those cookies from recycled cutters!  What is a recycled cutter, you say?  Simple– it’s just combining shapes or possibly trimming shapes to make regular cookies into something completely new. It saves you space and money when cutters do “double duty,” and it’s also neat to see what shapes you can make.
Today, for my “recycled” shapes, I’m going to be using a mason jar, a shell, and a small circle.
First, I want to combine my mason jar and shell to make a jar full of flowers.  Just cut these out as a single shape and smoosh the pieces together a little bit before baking. The cookie will bake solid, and your icing will cover the separate cutter lines.  I used the jar and small circle for a jar of lemonade with a lemon wedge on it– I’ll show you that one in a minute.
Begin with this jar of flowers.  Decide what color you want your jar to be.  I decided on white with light blue accents, to remind me of the classic blue Ball jar look.  Outline your jar and jar top.  Take some very stiff icing and pipe some grassy looking stems for your flowers.  If you need a refresher course on icing making, check out my tutorial here.  Allow these stems to dry completely before you start adding flowers.
You know, as a side note . . . this was the first time I ever made a mason jar full of flowers.  However . . . I think this would be super easy cookie to personalize for almost any other occasion you are doing.  The “flowers” were just extra icing I had from making the other pieces of the cookies. It was neat, because the flowers matched perfectly to what the other cookies looked like, and I didn’t even have to waste any icing!  Score!
I went ahead and made some lemon cookies, too.  I got this cutter in another set that I needed for something else, and it was about time to use it.  I thought that Mason jars and lemonade just went together.  These lemons are outlined in white, and they are flooded in lemon yellow.
To add some details, allow the lemon bases to dry and add a few accent dots of icing.
After my flower stems were dry, I added little dots of icing in random spots to make the “flowers.”  Just go ahead and use the colors you are already using for your other cookies.  White, yellow, and blue looked very nice in my bouquet, and the flowers perfectly matched the rest of the cookies.
I also piped the “Ball” jar logo.  This was my first time trying Mason Jar cookies– if I had it to do over, I would have used a smaller piping tip– maybe a number 1 instead of the 2 I used.  Go ahead and add a few flourishes to the edges to give the jar some dimension.
I wasn’t crazy about these lemon wedges, and I think the jar of lemonade could be improved.  But, hey . . . that’s why you practice!  🙂  I really liked the jar full of flowers and the regular lemons. So next time, I’ll definitely keep those, with a few tweaks.  Notice the little circle/jar combo?  I used it for a jar of lemonade with a lemon wedge garnish.  Like I said, I wasn’t crazy about how this cookie turned out, but I think it has possibilities for the future.  I think next time I’d add some lines on the jar tops, as well.  But it’s all the learning process.  Overall, I really liked the collection, together.



Photo by Jill Lang
And, as usual, Jill made the cookies look ten times better than I ever could.  😉  Thanks, Jill-Jill. 🙂
Make these soon!  And enjoy summer’s loveliness anytime of the year. 🙂
You did it. And I’m just so proud of you.









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