Sheriff Sugar Cookies

These cookies are so cute they should be arrested!

I'm sorry....I'm here for my own amusement. I'm amused easily. I needed to say that. I'm done.
Soooo....I'm back in full shower mode. The 5-day shower count down has begun. I'm more behind than I've ever been for a shower, but this shower is for, pretty much, the most laid back person in my phone book, so I know what I get done....she will love. Any pressure I feel is of my own self-making. I like making myself sick with pressure.
I think I've mentioned one or twenty times that I'm having a dessert bar at the Cowgirl themed shower as the favor station (instead of my usual candy bar, it's an obsession)? Mostly because I found some cute buckets at Target and wanted to justify purchasing them. It went from 5 to 7 desserts (not to mention the actual 'dessert' that will go with the meal). I stopped at 7....only b/c they ran out of pink buckets at Target.

The next dessert I made (Sunday night when I got home from my trip, I was tired, but determined) were Sugar Cookies shaped like Sheriff badges. I don't know why I'm proud of this idea. I've also been exposed to too much sun, and not enough sleep, so don't trust my judgement.
At work, it's sort of a tradition to make these sugar cookies for showers. I love them, and I hope every teacher at my school has 6 more babies, and renews their vows yearly so we can continue to eat them at lots of spring showers. They are so sweet they make your teeth hurt....and my goal in life is to eat enough of these that I end life with no teeth, but a really gummy, happy smile. The gal who shared the recipe with us (Kristin Z) also taught all her sugar cookie followers that you can add light karo syrup to the icing, and it hardens so that you can bag 'em up....and so the tradition of making these cookies for shower favors was harvested.
First cookie stop-star cookie cutter. I found gray M&Ms at Michael's (the price on colored M&M's are pretty much next to highway robbery, but I used a coupon).
I piped the outside of the icing first, it hardened really quickly (within 15 minutes), and then I just squiggled in the middle and smoothed it with a knife within a few minutes of 'squiggly' so it wouldn't also harden and be set in the squiggly state (very technical). The outside, hardened icing helped me spread a little more succinctly on the cookie. There are a bunch of techniques for building the outer dam on cookies, and then putting a more 'liquid' inner icing inside the lines by adding more water/milk etc too the rest of the icing to make it really smooth, or even smoothing with a warm knife....but I'm not really a fan of following directions or rules. Here is a picture of the icing process, but don't listen to me, there is probably 16 easier ways to do this, trust me...I can't be trusted on these sort of things.

After icing, I thought about writing Alexis' whole name, but then I remembered I wasn't an overachiever, and why start now? I just went with the initial. I had reserved a little icing to dye pink for the initial. I played around with the letter....little dots at the end of the letter? No....too much effort. How about a swirly A? I set them in the oven to dry over night (though they were really dry within a few hours, but it was 12 when I was done icing...1 AM vacation time....and I thought I might want to consider sleep.

In case you were wondering, those pans are vintage 2002...don't be jealous, build a time machine and get yourself a pair as spiffy as these beauties.

I then had a really intense debate on ribbon, or folding down the packing bags and sealing with stickers. It's these things that are important to me and nobody else. I had to consider how many other desserts I had, what sort of bows would be on the other offerings (b/c they each need to be different, yet similar). I then began researching therapist and checked on my insurance coverage, finished the cookies, and lived to blog another day.