The Great Cookie Adventure

Since Noah is so enamored with Thomas the Train, I thought it would be cute to have train cookies for his birthday party.  Little did I know what I was getting myself into. . .

I found a set of train-shaped cookie cutters on Amazon for $8 and set to work making a triple batch of sugar cookies.  Though time-consuming, baking was the "easy" part.

Once cooled, I had to icing them all.  I actually had never worked with royal icing before.  Thankfully, a dear friend of mine brought over her "tackle box" of cake decorating paraphernalia and gave me a crash course.  Who knew that egg whites would make icing harden?!?

So, we set to work about 7pm.  We had two batches of icing - one "thick" to outline and one "thin" to flood.  Each batch was divided in thirds for our three colors.  My "expert" friend outlined them all with her wonderfully-steady hand while another friend and I attempted to flood them.  Let's just say the first few were rather awful-looking.  But we eventually got the hang of it and turned out almost six dozen cookies by the stroke of midnight.

There was, of course, a "royal" mess to clean up when all was said and done.  But the cookies turned out rather well, all things considered.  They were very tasty and didn't look half-bad, either.  They were a big hit at the party and I had extra to share with the kids at church the following week.

In hindsight, I will think twice before undertaking such an "adventure" again.  But who can say "no" to this face when he asks for a "Thomas cookie"?  :)

Happy birthday, Noah!