December has always been the busiest month for me. The baking, shopping, wrapping gifts and sending cards and cookies and it seems to just get more hectic each year. But all my busyness came to a screeching halt last Friday. I was at the chiropractor office and when I sitting in low back traction I was looking through my phone at good ol facebook and saw people commenting about a shooting. What?? Not another one, what is going on?? Then I switched to a news app on my phone and I saw what was going on. A shooting at an elementary school and possibly over 20 dead so far. My heart sank. I ran out of there and couldn't have raced home fast enough to pick up my 2 year old to go get my 4 year old from school. I hugged them so tight all weekend and I am pretty sure they thought I was smothering them. I tried to stay offline most of the weekend, every time I read a story I would start to cry. It really hit me so hard, being a mom now, I couldn't imagine what those families are going through, especially so close to Christmas. The joy that this month brings, kids look forward to Christmas all year and now those families are left with grief and sadness and emptiness. Its awful. I can't even deal with the thought of " what if it had been my kid's school".
On Monday I was looking at posts from a blog group I belong to on Facebook and a few of the gals, Dorothy from Crazy for Crust and Ashton from Something Swanky, were talking about doing something in honor of the lives lost. Like a bloggers unite for Sandy Hook. Sort of like the Peanut Butter Pie for Mikey a while back. A food writer had lost her husband last year and asked the blogging community to make his favorite pie, a peanut butter pie in his honor. So this is similar to that we are making cookies and or crafts in honor of the lives lost. and I jumped right in asking what I could do to help etc. I was brainstorming ideas with some of the other bloggers when we came up with the idea of a cookie or a craft, and something kid friendly that either kids could do or help out with. I decided on sugar cookies. My kids absolutely love sugar cookies, I always give them some dough to roll out and cut and play with on their own baking mats. They have a blast just playing with the dough. I also frosted a couple cookies for them and had them decorate with sprinkles and they ate them faster than I could get a picture with my camera, just phone pics.
These are the cookies my girls decorated. Got sprinkles?
And these are the ones I made. 8 for the sweet little boys that lost their lives, 12 for the adorable girls that lost theirs and 6 for the brave teachers and administrators that tried to stop the madman from doing any more harm than he did. I am in tears writing this. My heart and thoughts are with the families that lost a child and loved one from this horrific tragedy that I hope our country never ever has to experience ever again.
For the boys
For the girls
For the teachers and staff
I don't work with royal icing much, usually just my one batch of cookies at Christmastime, I am no Sweetopia or Sweet Sugarbelle, but I tried my best and made sure each one was different and special, and in memory of the lives lost at Sandy Hook.
Snowflake Sugar Cookies for #BloggersforSandyHook
Ingredients
- 1 Cup butter, softened, 2 sticks
- 1 Cup sugar
- 1 large egg
- 2 tsp. pure vanilla extract
- 3 Cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp. baking powder
- ⅛ teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400°.
- Cream together the butter and sugar.
- Add the egg and the vanilla, mix until well blended.
- In a separate bowl, sift together the flour and baking powder then gradually add to the butter mixture and blend well.
- Form the dough into a smooth ball. Roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface to a thickness of ⅛ to ¼ inch.
- Cut out with cookie cutters and place on ungreased cookie sheets.
- Fill each cookie sheet with cookies of equal size to ensure even baking.
- Bake for 6 minutes (a bit longer for thicker cookies), but they shouldn’t brown at all. Remove from cookie sheets and cool on wire racks or waxed paper. Decorate as desired when cool.
Here is a list of the other bloggers that are participating, check out their posts and see what they baked and crafted for this event.
Hezzi-D's Books and Cooks, The Red Headed Baker, Real Housemoms, Crazy for Crust, Something Swanky, Life After Laundry, Two Kids Cooking, Frugal Foodie Mama, The Doctorate Housewife, Heather's French Press, Operation Dinnertime, Lovely Pantry, What's Cooking Love?, Cupcakes and Kale Chips, Occasionally Crafty, Pint Sized Baker, Pineapple and Coconut, Wine & Glue, Lemonsforlulu, A Sweet Baker, Mom On Timeout, The Freshman Cook, Sweet Twist of Blogging, A Family Feast, Julie's Eats & Treats, Eat at Allie's, Here Comes the Sun, The Kitchen is My Playground, Just My Crazy Kitchen, The Sweet Chick, The Tasty Fork, Wholly Delicious Dishes, Chocolate, Chocolate and more , Yours and Mine ARE Ours, Kitchen Meets Girl, Daily Dish Recipes, Sweet Bella Roos, Mom's Test Kitchen Persnickety Plates
If you participated and want to be included on the list then feel free to add your link using this linky tool.
Also if you didn't participate with a cookie or a craft and want to donate to help the families with things like funeral costs or anything else please click this link for more information on how to make a donation. I am sure anything is appreciated.
Ojin says
It's great that you use seasonal ingredients!