Cookie decorating lasted all of ... about ten minutes!!

Sandi and I thought it was a brilliant idea to have the kids decorate sugar cookies for Christmas. However, she was sick today and wasn't feeling particularly festive so I thought I would undertake this challenge. Challenge? Well, today it was going to be just Tyler and RJ and they don't necessarily agree on much of anything right now. They truly are like brothers. They love each other -- and I do believe that -- however, there are times when I don't think they necessarily like each other at that moment.

But, they both seemed excited about the project at hand. And we had two different colors of icing -- I cheated on this one and bought 'rolled out cookie dough'. I didn't know that there were packages of icing -- red and green -- with the dough so was a little relieved that I didn't have use my Kitchen Aid mixer which seems to project confectioners sugar all over the kitchen before I get it nicely mixed. The outcome of the icing is great -- but, I'm not particularly fond of the process. Mine is a little older mixer and it doesn't have the shield. I've tried all kinds of things -- including spreading a big towel over the counter and setting the mixer on it. Maybe that would work -- it didn't so I just gave up on that and resigned myself to cleaning up after mixing. I'm glad I did take that cake decorating class years ago so the icing comes out nice and actually dries so that the cookies aren't gooey.

Okay ... all that to say that for about 10 minutes, RJ and Tyler managed to control their urges to chase each other through the house and settled in to decorate cookies. I thought we were doing a pretty good job until Tyler reached for the little 'balls' and said he really needed to add a pimple to his cookie. Pimple? (It's right below an eye!)

I asked RJ how he liked his creations and he assured me he they were very colorful. Tyler kept wanting to mix red and green but Tim and Sandi assured him he would not want the color it produced. I would probably still have the cookies long after the holiday season passed. Of course, my camera was handy!!!

As you can tell, RJ became more interested in eating the "sprinkles" rather than using them. And while I am writing this, he has told me thought he would like to eat one of the cookies and promptly came back to say, "Thank you for the cookies, Nina!"

I raised four girls so decorating cookies seemed to be part of the territory. However, I think roping these little guys into the project and trying to sell them on the idea that it's going to be LOTS of fun was a little stretch. Before too long, they began to get a little antsy and Tyler informed me he thought he was done now. Oh, well ... it was fun while it lasted and I go some good photos!