Cream Filled Chocolate Sandwich and Sugar Cookies

 I took part in  my very first cover shoot this morning.

                                                                                     In my kitchen.

Actually, I was the baker, the stylist and the photographer. I pretty much was the shoot...

                                                              ...me, and a couple of  my favorite Martha Stewart cookie recipes.

My kitchen was like an episode of Master Chef  meets America's Next Top Model with just a little American Idol thrown in for good measure.  Any one who may have happened to stop by last night would have known from the mess that was on every surface in the kitchen that something big was going on.

I spent most of the early part of last night trying to decide if I was Gordon Ramsay, Tyra Banks, Jennifer Lopez or, in the later hours of the evening...Martha Stewart.

Cover hopefuls were lined up around the counter (on cooling racks) waiting for their turn to show off their very best side.  Of course, it was clear that not all of them would make it to the finals.  Several plain, heart shaped, shortbread cookies showed up. Heck, even a round chocolate cookie was there...clearly someone hadn't seen the February issue of  Martha Stewart Living

By this morning, as the sun rose, the cookies had cooled and final preparations had begun. The pink background was in place and the cookies were paired up and filled with the still slightly cool vanilla cream. Have you ever worked with a fresh batch of cookies?  With vanilla cream filling? Trust me...It's not as easy as you'd think.

Oh sure, it all looks easy enough. But cookies area jealous bunch when it comes to cover shoots. They're all secretly sizing each other up, trying to decide who they should partner with and where they want to position themselves to be in focus in the shot and not end up beneath the printing on the final cover.

Then, the icing starts to melt just a little from the lamp that's been plugged in because it's grey outside today and threatens to make a mark on the lovely pink paper back ground.

And let's not forget about the ribbon (actually I did forget about it). Yep...the red and pink ribbon...for the side of the shot.  I completely forgot about it...until 7:30 this morning.

Did you know that Hobby Lobby is closed on Sunday...and that Michael's doesn't open until 10 a.m.? It's a good thing that I had a couple of random pieces in my stash...because I had somewhere to be at 10:30 this morning and the icing was growing warmer by the minute even though it was freezing outside.

In the end, it all worked out. The "best of the best" made it to the cover and the others were content to take their place on a plate on the counter. The plain shortbread cookies decided to hang around for a couple of days for a Pinterest recipe shoot that's going to happen tomorrow or Tuesday. I think that they'll be just fine with a little make up icing.

This afternoon, all of the cookies, those who made it and those who didn't,  were invited to a little tasting....of course, it was a success.  In my opinion, so was my cover shoot:

and the words, "Martha, eat your heart out" have new meaning in my life. (comeon...you know I'm kidding!)

If you'd like to make your own, the recipe for the sugar cookies is HERE. The recipe for the vanilla cream filled chocolate sandwich cookies is HERE.


xo,







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