Gnome Cookies

I made these gnome cookies using a cookie cutter I found at a 100 yen(=a dollar) store. Actually the cutter is meant to become Santa, but isn't this tiny cutter perfect for a gnome?

Recently, one of my students of the beginner course asked me about how I decorate animals wearing a hat or scarf. (She asked that because she didn't think her snowman cookie wearing a hat look right.) You could just pipe all the outlines and flood each area, but to make it look right, you could go with a different method.

In order to make it look right, the beard needs to be thicker than clothes, and the hat needs to be thicker than the beard. First, I flooded clothes a little bit over the borders(①). Then piped outline for the beard on the extra bit of the clothes(②). I did the same for the beard and the hat(③④).

After the process above, I piped the shoes and shoelace, and the details such has knitted pattern on the hat, the nose and hands, etc. The signs they hold are royal icing transfers.

 

If the beard shape is not so complicated, you could flood each area separately like the example below.

I used the same technique for the hair on the character cookies I made this summer and last summer.

The hair has a lot of jagged edges, so it's quite tricky to flood the hair and face separately and make the border clean.

It's easier and look more natural to flood the face up to the forehead and then flood the hair over the forehead.

I did the same for the volleyball guy in the photo below. I also piped the collar over the clothes.