Last week I was trying to come up with cute ideas for Christmas cookies......
with a shape that would ship well.
It occurred to me to try to make a bunch of things on rectangle shapes......
And that is how "Rectangle Buddies" was born.
I've got Christmas Rectangle Buddies to share today
and Winter Rectangle Buddies coming up after the holidays. :)
For the Christmas versions,
I made a gingerbread man, a primitive manger scene, and a nutcracker.
Obviously you will need rectangle cookies for all of these. ;)
I used this cutter but you could easily hand cut these with a knife.
By using actual gingerbread dough for the gingerbread men, the decorating is simple.
Make an outline of the head and body.
Add eyes (simplified by making a big white dot of glaze and adding a black pearl within)
a smile, some buttons, and a head "swirl".
For the primitive nativity, make a long rectangle body for Joseph,
a shorter rectangle body for Mary.
Add tan circles for the heads.
After these have dried for an hour or two, add a small rectangle body for baby Jesus. :)
For fun......add a "star on a stick" above Mary and Joseph.
After the manger scenes have dried overnight,
use a mixture of almond extract and gold pearl dust to paint on some shine to the star.
And finally, the nutcracker starts with making a tan square face in the middle of the rectangle.
After an hour or two (dry time to prevent bleeding),
add a black square on top and a red square on bottom.
Giving the sections at least 30 minutes to dry,
add a light-colored line across the black hat (color is not important since it will turn gold later),
some eyes with the same technique as the gingerbread men above,
and a tan nose.
Add a small red rectangle shape above the red square (over the tan) for the upper part of the mouth
and some dots in a light-colored glaze down the front of the red uniform for buttons.
After these have dried overnight,
paint the line on the hat and the buttons with the gold pearl dust + almond extract.
Add white glaze details to form eye brows, mustache, teeth, and beard.
Some fun unique cookies for Christmas!
(And they are sturdy for shipping.....)
