April showers bring May flowers and floral cookies.  May is a time to celebrate spring and mothers.  There are a lot of wonderful women in my life who I look up to, and some of them don’t have children, but are wonderful examples and are what I call “mothering”; to their nieces and nephews, to their neighbors, their friends, to me, to their fur babies (pets).  What a wonderful day to recognize these wonderful women in our lives!

Speaking of moms, I hope you don’t mind while I wax poetic about my mom for a bit.  My mother is everything I aspire to be.  She is selfless in every way.  She bakes and makes everything from scratch, growing many of the ingredients in her own backyard.  I was the kid who would long for a breakfast of Lucky Charms because my mom made us eggs and pancakes and oatmeal every morning and sent us to school with homemade bread sandwiches slathered with homemade loganberry jam.  The travesty!  She sewed all of our clothes, swimsuits, and yes underwear believe it or not… I have several stories I could tell just about that fact.  Maybe another time?  She was the PTA president and bake sale queen.  She french braided 4 little girl’s hair in record time and was a cub scout den leader for her sons.  She worked from home, teaching countless piano lessons every day.  Every Saturday I would wake to the sound of a wheat mill grinding flour for waffles and the smell of maple.  She wallpapered our rooms, costumed our Halloweens, and taught us where we came from and to always have faith.  

It boggles my mind to think of how she managed the six of us (often times, there were a few extra underfoot) and still found time to volunteer and serve so many.  Now that all her kids are grown and out of the house, she is still more busy than I am!  She is constantly serving, baking, sewing, DO-ing for someone.  I am so lucky my mom and dad live 15 minutes away because I love spending time with them, but it is common for them to be off visiting their 19 grandchildren who are scattered across 4 states.  I have to share.  

I could go on and on about my mom, and I hope you got a good snapshot of who Daphne is.  Everyone should know my mom!  As I’ve become a mom I appreciate all mothers that much more.  We are trying our best and we have the best job in the world!  I hope you enjoy this Mother’s Day and appreciate all the moms and motherers in your life.  Go hug a mom!                  

Any mom would love the cookies we decorate this month and are easily customizable for someone special.  The lavender cookie is a simple and elegant way to say “I love you” while the painted brush embroidery bouquet is an adventurous technique that looks impressive (but is easier than it looks.  promise!).  And lastly we create our sweet little dimensional dog cookies that turned out so fun and each with there own personality!  Three wonderful cookiers and moms joined me in the kitchen: Sally Fraise of Sweetiedoodle, Andrea Garner of Bella Cakes, and Christina Ramsey who is a fabulous cookier NOT on Facebook.  

We had a special surprise this month when emmy award winning singer/songwriter and actress Katherine Nelson came by the sound studio to be our visiting professor.  She shares her beautiful voice and songwriting talents as she sings with the incredibly awesome Beth Fredlund, guitarist and vocalist.  I find Katherine’s music so uplifting and inspirational and I love to cookie to it because it is so positive and beautiful.  You may just find yourself singing along… I DID!  Listen in on the Expert Lab.  After we sang together I chatted with Katherine and Beth about how being creative can help us be better mothers and find balance in our lives.  We talk about Katherine’s musical message of empowering women, giving ourselves permission to be happy… and cat food flavored cookies!…  they might even break into song in Mixing It Up.   

After School:  It’s time for another round of “Cookie Comments and have we got some doozies!  Once again I’ve collected a variety of interesting comments and messages that have been received by cookiers.  Laura Ewing (Cadillac Cookies) and Rebecca Weld (The Cookie Architect) help me read through the ridiculous and REAL comments heard around the cookiesphere.  
A special thank you to those cookiers who contributed:

Penny Knapik:  Lucky Penny
Terry Commerford – CRUMBS Baking Company
Claire – The Simple, Sweet Life
Dany Lind – Dany’s Cakes
Raven Massé – Cookie Couture
Rebecca Weld – The Cookie Architect
 

Remember… no matter what anyone says, you are awesome.  

{If you have received interesting or ridiculous cookie comments I would love to hear them!  Send them my way at contact@artymcgoo.com  subject Cookie Comments so I don’t think you’re actually telling me I suck, unless you want to.}

Thank you so much to my fabulous fellow decorators Christina, Andrea, and Sally for creating with me!  And thank you to Katherine and Beth for sharing their beautiful music with us.  The cookies are in the mail… and they are not cat food flavored.  I hope you all have a fabulous Mother’s Day and that you enjoy making these cookies.  I have had a lot of requests for the dog tutorial so be sure to show me your furry friends when you’ve made them!  

All of the segments can be viewed as a show, but the McGoo U in particular is meant to be a class experience that you can cookie right along with.  So, if you’d like to cookie with me, here is what you will need for this month’s McGoo U:

McGoo U May Supply List

1. Cookies: rectangle (“Skinny Anita” from Whisked Away Cutters: 5″ x 1 1/5″), circle (2 3/4″), square or plaque or any shape really! (3″ Wilton Christmas plaque)
2. Royal Icing
3. food coloring  (see color guide below)
4. 4 Piping bags (optional closure of your choice)
5. couplers & rings (optional)
6. 3: #1.5 or #1 tips  
7. 1: #2 tips
8. 1″ x 1″ square white royal icing transfer on wax paper (the corners can be rounded, don’t stress)
9. small pearl dragees
10. Filbert paintbrush
11. liner/detail paintbrush
12. Paint palette with black, brown, green, ivory, yellow, pink, red, & peach food coloring
13. toothpicks or scribe tool
14. cup of water
15. paper towel
16. tweezers if you are cool like that!

 Prepare:

• Fill one piping bag with white royal icing of piping consistency, coupler, and a #1 or 1.5 tip 
• Fill one piping bag with flood-consistency white royal icing, coupler, and #2 tip (I use about a 12 count thickness)
• Fill one piping bag with piping-consistency lavender royal icing, coupler, and #1 or #1.5 tip
• Fill one piping bag with piping-consistency green royal icing, coupler, and #1 or #1.5 tip

Color Recipes:

Lavender: Wilton Violet + Americolor Electric Purple  

Green: Wilton Juniper + Americolor Electric Green)

FYI:  When I say “fill one piping bag” the amount completely depends on how many cookies you are making.  If you decorate 3 cookies you will only need a very small amount of RI in your bag.  

A lot of these supplies can be modified to your preferences.  If you use tipless bags, you can forgo the tips entirely (except when petal tips are used) or you can choose to use different food colorings.  (Click here for a detailed guide to setting up your palette)  I always appreciate when people make things their own and let their own creativity be their guide.  I’d love to see your creations!  This is all about having fun and not stressing.  Happy cookie-ying!