The Engineered Baker: 2017

Ramadan Lantern Cookies

A very belated Ramadan Mubarak to all of you! Hope that all of you had a wonderful start to this blessed month. It's the perfect time to take a break from all the drama and chaos of our lives and focus on what is important. I've been spending time with family and friends, breaking fast together, being charitable and working on multiple volunteer projects, well you get the idea!

As we all know, I always look for any excuse to bake cookies and make a banner. I love adding personal touches during any festive occasion and why should our annual ifter be any different. I made these cookies as part of the dessert spread, but it easily doubled as part of the table décor!

I've had this lantern cookie cutter from With a Spin for a while, but have been wanting to do something different with it, and finally decided to make a lantern banner!

I used my go to short bread cookie recipe and decorated with my to go royal icing.

To decorate the cookies, I first flooded all the cookies with white frosting and let it dry over night. Then I piped the letter on with a thicker consistency of royal icing shaded with purple food color. With the leftover frosting I added rosettes using a star tip and drop of green frosting to make a leaf (this I had to do because I can't seem to use the leaf tip!)

Thanks for stopping by!

Enjoy!

Farhana

Don't forget, caring is sharing!

Theme Week 2 : Day 3 of Mother's Day Cards

Why hello there all! I am still playing catch up after being sick the past week, so today's post is not only delayed but it's going to be a super short one, as my to-do list if a foot long and I decided that taking a nap was a better idea. Since these posts got delayed, I'm sharing cards with different sentiments that you can change to "Happy Mother's Day" or you can always stick to the thank you sentiment, Mother's day is about being thankful, right :)

This card is super quick and easy to make, as there is no coloring, just a lot of punching (gather your scraps and turn on a movie and punch away!) Once the punching was done I created a wreath shape and used multi media matte to stick the cutouts on to the card base. Then I added the paper "ribbon and bow". I finished the card with a simple stamped sentiment and some washi tape.

Yep! That's it :) Before you know it you'll have a stack of cards!

Supplies used:

Happy Crafting!

Farhana

Don't forget, caring is sharing!

Theme Week 2 : Day 2 of Mother's Day Cards

Welcome back to day 2 of my mother's day theme week, this post was supposed to be a week ago, but then I got sick, baby S got sick, and the only productive thing I did is finish a scrapbook of our vacation from October of last year. Anyways, I'm ready to start this week and start checking things of my really, really long to do list. I just realized that its already Tuesday, and I've been to busy enjoying the weather! Time to be productive, so let's get straight to the point!

These cards were inspired by the talented Jennifer McGuire. Stop by her blog and see all the techniques and ideas that she shares! I'm not going to go into details of the technique as that would be reinventing the wheel! I will share the changes I made to use the supplies that I have and not buy more stuff!

I love accenting my cards with metallic or glitter paper, and for this I used foiled gold die cuts. The frame is from Pretty Pink Posh and the sentiment is my favorite from Right at Home. You'll be seeing this sentiment showing up many, many more times! I'm just in love with it!! Thanks Nicole!

As for inks, I used Fresh Inks from Impress Cards and Crafts. Since they are pigment inks, you can add embossing powder if you are really quick! Once I have stamped them all, I take my heat gun to all the pieces at once, helps save time and keeps the gun nice and hot :)

This pink one is my favorite! Which one is your? I love making these so much I can't wait to make time to make a ton more! This stamp set from Altenew has quickly made it to my favs!!

Hopefully I'll be back tomorrow to share a new card! As long as I get through my to do list! Hope you have a productive Tuesday! And one last thing, if you want to get your hands on one of these cards, stop by my etsy shop!

Supplies used:

Happy Crafting!

Farhana

Don't forget, caring is sharing!

Theme Week 2 : Day 1 of Mother's Day Cards

Oh my! After a week of crafting, creating and planning a theme week for Mother's Day, I got sick on Sunday, so ended up sleeping most of the day, and the next day. Finally woke up today and decided to try be at least a tad bit productive. And I think I managed that as laundry is folded, the kitchen is cleaned, job application done and a new card is up on my Etsy shop. Yep! My Etsy shop is back :) Please stop by sometime!

Now back to today's card, which you can purchase on Etsy if your not much of a card maker! But if you want to make it, let's get started! The backgrounds are stamped using Fresh Ink from Impress Cards and Crafts. Then I stamped the flowers and leaves using copic friendly ink and colored them using Altenew Artist Markers (still working on my shading/blending skills!), once colored I fussy cut them.

To pull the card together I diecut a hexagon using a Pretty Pink Posh die, stamped the sentiment from Newtons Nook Designs using Fresh Ink from Impress Cards and Crafts. I added some dimension to the card by using foam tape to adhere the hexagon as well as some of the flowers. Finally finished off the card with some sequins!

Thank for stopping by today, hopefully I'll be back tomorrow with another post!

Supplies used:

Happy Crafting!

Farhana

Don't forget, caring is sharing!

(very late) Spring Cookies

Welcome back to my blog! Oh my how long has it been :( But let's not dwell on that, we all know that I can never manage to blog on a schedule or blog regularly! So no promises or chit chat, just going to share my cookies and come back when I have time to share something else.

I made this cookies a LONG time ago for a friend, and thought that I would share them for Spring, but a month into spring I am still trying to get into a schedule with everything that is happening around me.

My baby turned one! Yes ONE!! (birthday party details will be on the blog soon, hopefully). So A and I have been going out a lot more now that she actually understands more of the world around her and the weather is getting better! AND I have started looking for a job, which is like a full time job!

Back to the cookies, I think it'll be a while till I do a set with so many colors! TIP: if you are using multiple colors, make a list with a note of what consistencies that you need, so that you are not mixing colors through out the whole decorating process.

After decorating a few set of cookies, I have also started sketching out my designs so that I know which colors I'll use for flooding and how long I'll need in between for drying. Practice makes perfect and I'm so grateful for all the cookies that I get to make for my friends and family to get all the practice!

Once you have your colors set and ready, decorating is the fun part! For these cookies, I used Mini Squeeze Bottles to flood the cookies and frosting bags to add the details with multiple round and star frosting tips (if you want you know the exact ones, please leave me a comment and I'll go and check the numbers of the ones I used).

Thanks for stopping by and hope that you are enjoying spring! I sure a with my little one :) And hopefully I will be back soon with more posts!

Enjoy!

Farhana

Quick Valentines Day Cards

Happy February! Yep we are 1 month into 2017 and I honestly cannot believe all that has happened. But this blog is my happy place, where I like to pretend that everything is all unicorns and rainbows!

I'm not a Valentines person, that's just not me. I prefer more personal holidays like anniversaries and birthdays! But when Nicole from Right at Home share some cards that she made for a card drive (detail can be found here), I knew that I have to make a contribution, no matter how small.

So in an hour with a crying baby, I made 18 of these cards, there were supposed to be 20, 2 didn't make it. I cased the idea from Nicole's cards, and using her lovely products made this cards look great in no time at all!

I stamped the background directly onto the card base using multiple colors of Fresh Inks from Impress Cards and Crafts. Then I die cut the heart from paper matching the ink colors, and heat embossed the sentiment from a old Simon Says Stamp monthly card kit using white embossing powder. Lastly I adhered the hearts to the stamped card base using foam tape.

I hope these cards inspire you to do something creative and spread some kindness!

Supplies used:

Happy Crafting!

Farhana

Don't forget, caring is sharing!

Find the Beauty Card Trio

Why make one card when you can make three! That's just something I do when I get my supplies out to start crafting. I haven't had an unlimited amount of time to craft and that time is about to get shorter with my goal to get a job, but we make the best with what we have, right?

I ordered this set a when it came out in the fall, but I never really got around to using it as the end of the year just flew past me. But better than never, right?

It was a rather gloomy day here in the PNW and I thought I'd brighten the day using some color on my stamps. I used the Bits & Pieces: Winter from Right at Home to create the background. For the sentiments, I die cut squares from a MFTs die set, and white heat embossed all three of the sentiments the Find the Beauty set, also from Right at Home. I stamped multiples of each of the flower from the set using Fresh Inks from Impress Cards and Crafts and fussy cut them (Nicole has matching die cuts at Right at Home) as I was in front of the TV, layering them on to the card using foam tape. To finish of the card I added a sprinkle of Pretty Pink Posh sequins.

Supplies used:

Happy Crafting!

Farhana

Don't forget, caring is sharing!

Winter Birthday Cards (with Right at Home)

Hey there! Hope you all had a great (crafty) weekend! I can't complain about my weekend, Seahawks win and dinner with friends, AND I watched like 2.5 movies!

Excuse the black background, still learning to take pictures, but really wanted to share the cards!

So what do you do with holiday stamps after the season is gone? Make themed birthday cards of course! This winter themed layering stamp set from Right at Home, and its perfect for making hoidays cards! But I don't make many holidays cards, so instead used them to create birthday cards. I use a lot of those!

I used fresh inks from Impress Cards and Crafts to stamp the images. As these are pigment inks, make sure to let it dry or use a heat gun to speed up the process. Once it was dry I die cut the paper with a border die and the sentiment using a sentiment die. I added a scrap piece of paper at the back the matched the inks used to stamp the images. Finally I attached them to my card base.

Supplies used:

Happy Crafting!

Farhana

Don't forget, caring is sharing!

Pokemon Cookies

I need say I was going to blog more frequently, so this is me trying. Also seeing as this started as a baking blog, I thought why not start the year with a few cookies. Making cookies makes me happy, sharing cookies make me happy. After making these cookies, I got upset, but as this is the year of "Happy" I'm not going to share that story. So, what ended up happening to these cookies? They went to my brother in law who is a HUGE Pokemon fan and actually plays the game. TBH I have no clue as to what goes on in the game, I just used google/Pinterest to get an idea about Pokemon parties.

I believe that every experience is a learning lesson, and I finally learnt how to make red and black royal icing! I won't be making it all the time, as the amount of food color makes icing a tad bit bitter, but sometimes its all for the looks!

These are very easy cookies to make once you get the icing in the right colors. Start with baking your favorite cookie recipe using a circle cutter (don't have one? use a glass or mug.).

Once the cookies are cooled and you have you frosting ready cover half the cookie with white frosting and the other half with red. Set the cookies aside to let the frosting dry for a bit, then with a fine tip nozzle cover the middle of the cookie with a few lines of the black frosting and a small circle in the center. I added a drop of white immediately in the center of the black, but you could wait it out if you want to add some dimension.

Lastly, let the cookies dry uncovered for at least 6 hours. Then store in an air tight container for about a week! Hopefully they won't last that long!

Recipes and tips for baking the cookies and making the frosting can be found here and here. For the black frosting I used wilton black gel color. The trick I learnt from a fellow cookie maker is to add the food color and let it stand for some time. And for the red food color I used a combination of Americolor Super Red and Americolor Red Red.

Happy Baking!

Farhana

Hello 2017

Wait! What? It'd already the 4th? Only 4 days in and this year is already running away from me.

Let's start playing catch up then! Happy New Year! I hope that your 2016 was a awesome as mine!! I know that no year is perfect, 2016 had lots of hatred, lots of sadness and for me personally, it was a year of learning. I learnt more in the last 12 months, then I have probably learnt in my entire life. I am not going to bore you with the details, but I will share some of my goals (I'm really not a resolution person) for 2017. Maybe this way I will hold my self accountable and be more motivated to actually get things DONE!

Let's start with the main goal this year, something that I put off till 2017:

1. Find a Job : as you might know I was working till last January and it didn't work out with maternity leave and commuting. So I have official started the search, let's see how it goes.

2. Blog more often : This is always a goal, and some months are better than others, but I think if I actually plan it out, I get it done! So hopefully you'll here from me more often!

3. Create more : this probably should go before blogging as the more I create, the more I can blog.

4. Travel more : Hoping that I get the job and can travel even more, but for now vacations from January to March are in the works :D

5. Scrapbook more : I have so many pictures and memories, printed and digital that need to be put into albums. Slowly working on them, unfortunately not fast enough! Esp with little Aleena's pictures.

6. Get Fit : not necessarily lose weight, that's not my goal, the goal is to actually get fit so that I can go snowboarding and hiking and I don't always feel tired.

7. Read a book a month : I've been successfully doing this for about 2 years now and loving it, so here's to another year of reading!

8. Give more : About a few weeks ago I decided that I should DO more, just in general. And hence started trying to volunteer more and give more (not just in donations, but in time.) After a successful card and toy drive, I am motivated to do more.

9. Collect Memories not Things : (yes I tend to buy way to many crafting supplies, I should probably use more that I buy this year.) But I want to start living in the moment and enjoying the little things, especially with Aleena growing up so fast.

Okay, time to skip over the little ones and fast forward to the main "goal" of the year.

10. Be Happy : Yes, as easy as it might seem to do, we tend to dwell on the little things and let their negativity pull us down. If someone or something is not adding value to your life, let them/it go. Your better off without them, and your time and energy is better spent else where.Out with the bad, in with the good!

I really hope that the long post didn't bore you. Took me a while to write the post as it's almost never that I really open up on the blog.

Here's to a Happy, Cheerful and Productive New Year!

Happy New Year!

Farhana

PS. The cake and cookie decorating ideas were found on Pinterest and made for a New Years Eve party that I went too.

Cookie recipe can be found here, Cookie icing recipe here, Cake recipe here and lastly Cake frosting recipe here.

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