Winter Tree Cookies and Chocolate Snowflakes

I had a lot of ideas for Christmas cookies this year since it’s the first year I’ve gotten really into decorating cookies.  I decided that all my ideas would go nicely as a group, since they were all forest-themed.  The design for the trees and birds are from this post on sweetsugarbelle’s blog, and I had seen the pine cones here.  I also made some snowflakes as part of a present for my dad (see below).  I wanted the background colour of the snowflakes to be dark to contrast with the icing, but I’m not particularly into gingerbread cookies.  Then I remembered saving sweetapolita’s chocolate sugar cookie recipe, and it seemed like the perfect solution.  I’m not sure how I feel about the recipe – the re-rolled cookies seemed a little tough, and I’m not sure if I got the baking time quite right since it was hard to tell from the appearance whether they were done.  I might experiment with it a bit more or try a new recipe.