Sun Cookies and HOW TO SHIP COOKIES

You know the song, sing it with me... You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. You make me happy when skies are grey... I bought my granddaughter an adorable sun dress this past summer and so I just had to make cookies to match. And I'm going to show you how I ship cookies. I've been extremely lucky ever since I started shipping cookies this way. I only ship cookies to family and friends because I run a licensed kitchen in California and our state's Cottage Food Law (CFO) does not allow shipping cookies for orders, but I know a lot of us will be shipping cookies soon for the Go Bo Foundation, so I thought this might help. If you want information regarding your state's CFO laws, you can get that by clicking HERE.

Sun Cookie Cutter Available HERE

Download Tutorial Cards HERE

Free Printable Cookie Tags HERE

I started with my sun cookie cutter available HERE

 I outlined my design to match the dress that I got Abigail. I loved adding the pink outline to the orange design.

 I flooded the orange part first and then did the yellow. The orange set just enough while I was working on the yellow that I could go back and add the yellow dots to the wet orange. I like to do that when it's not completely wet, but a little wet. That way the dots won't spread and they have just a tiny bit of standing up for dimension. When the yellow was completely dry (at least an hour), I added the pink cheeks to the sun.

 I thought they were so cute and I added some orange and yellow striped minis because the dress was mainly stripes.

 Such fun and happy cookies and the dress is pretty darn cute too.

 Then I bagged up the cookies and made a fun cookie tag which you can download too. See the link at the top of this blog post, highlighted in yellow for the cookie bag toppers and the tutorial cards.

 And here's my adorable granddaughter, Abigail, in her sun dress from grandma :)

 A lot of cookie decorators ship cookies and most pray and beg and hope that they will be okay. It is so incredibly stressful to spend so much time on making beautiful cookies and then have them arrive to the recipient broken. So I'm going to share what works for ME. Here's an example of my cookie packaged up...

I take a sheet of bubble wrap (12x12) and fold it in half and cut it. 

Then I use my heat sealer (you can get them on Ebay or Amazon or other places). They are very cost effective and work great to keep your cookies fresh. Mine is the 8" and I preferred the kind that doesn't cut because I like to use cookie tags. Here's an example of how to find a heat sealer, just click HERE and so I take my piece of bubble wrap that is now 12x6 and I fold that in half with the bubbles on the inside. Then I use my heat sealer to seal two of the sides (leaving one side open).

This creates a cookie pocket and the bubbles are on the inside to protect the cookie

Then I easily insert my cookie (that is already individually bagged and tagged) into the cookie pocket that I made with my bubble wrap and heat sealer. Easy peasy.

 Since the bubbles are on the inside (toward the cookie), it's easy to stack the cookies (standing up) without too much friction from the bubble wrap.

  I continue with all my cookies in this way. It's so nice and neat and you don't have to mess around with lots of little pieces of bubble wrap. The cookie pockets fit in nicely and easily.

 Then I lay one last piece of bubble wrap over the top (6x6 depending on the size of your cookie box). Then when I close the box, I tape down the front so there isn't any movement.

Then I personalize my cookie boxes with a coordinating ribbon and my cookie label

 I put my cookie box inside of a shipping box and add pillow pockets wherever needed for extra support

Then one pillow pocket over the top and the box is ready to seal and ship. I hope this helps! 

Note: it helps to get cookie boxes that are close to your usual size of cookie and create the cookie pocket to not have jiggle room.

It's the start of a 3-day weekend and my 22-year anniversary with hubby. We are going to go for a nice long walk and get dinner along the way. What are YOU doing special this labor day weekend?

Sun blog background for today: