How to Make Love Bird Cookies

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. So crazy to believe, right? It still feels like I’m coming down from Christmas’ sugar high. Time sure does fly when you're decorating cookies. ;)

With Valentine's being less than a week away, I know it may be a little too late to try this Valentine’s Day themed cookie set I’m about to show. However, the design is general enough that it could work for other occasions, as well. (I'm thinking weddings and anniversaries, maybe?)

This set of love bird cookies was created using three new cookie cutters now available in my shop: the tail feather birdie cutter, the birdcage cutter, and the ribbon banner cutter. The bird tail feather cookie cutter will be the main focus of this post, but I made sure to include design template ideas for the birdcage and ribbon banner cutter, as well.

Tail Feather Birdie Cookie Cutter

The tail feather birdie cookie cutter gets name from the “feather” detail that dominates the shape. The overall shape was kept simple to allow plenty of room for interpretation on how to decorate this cookie. For this love bird cookie set, I’ll be showing two different ways to decorate a male (and female) bird using this same cutter. Also, in an upcoming post, I’ll share a few other decorating ideas using this same cutter that you could use for other occasions.

Template for the Love Bird Cookies

I provided a downloadable template for all the design ideas shown below. In the template file, you can find both versions of the bird design (male and female), as well as design outlines for the birdcage and the ribbon banner cookies.

You can download the love bird cookies template HERE.

If you have a Kopykake or Pico projector, just print it out (or pull it up on your mobile device) and you are good to go. For those without a projector, follow the suggested steps below by cutting out the template and tracing the design onto the cookie with an edible food marker.

The Decorating Process

The steps below show are just a suggested way to to decorate these love bird cookies. Feel free to be inspired to decorate how you see fit. Go detailed or go simple; totally your call. Let’s get started!

You will need the following suggested colors:

• Light Blue piping and flood icing (I used Americolor Turquoise.)
• Darker Blue medium icing (I mixed Americolor Turquoise using a little more coloring gel.)
• Yellow medium icing (I mixed Americolor Lemon Yellow with Copper.)
• Green medium icing (I used Americolor Mint Green with Leaf Green.)
• White medium icing (I used Americolor Bright White.)
• Black medium icing (I used Americolor Super Black.)

Step 1

Begin by adding an almond-shaped eye with white icing. Let that set for 15 minutes, then add a ring of dark blue icing around the white eye.

Step 2

Next, with light blue piping icing, outline the body area and around the eye as shown. Leave room at the tips of the feathers. Then fill the outlined area with light blue flood icing. Let this icing set and dry (approximately 1 to 2 hours).

Step 3

Once the light blue base has dried, fill the tips of the feathers with dark blue icing. Then add the "tic-tac"-shaped middle toes and bottom beak oval with yellow icing, as shown. Leave this to set for about 15 minutes.

Step 3

Next, add a toe on each side of the middle toes, as shown. Add the larger upper beak slightly over the bottom oval. This will give the overall beak nice dimension.

With dark blue icing, pipe the wing and tail feather line details.

Step 4

Lastly, add the black eye pupil with black icing. You could stop here, or...

This part is totally optional: add a bow tie to make this bird a bit fancy. First, add the ends of the bow tie. Let that set for 15 minutes before adding the final dot in the middle.

The finished love bird should look like the one below. For a visual comparison, the female version is hanging out right beside him. The two love birds are decorated basically the same, with the exception of eye lashes and a hair bow. You can find the female design included in the template file I provided.

Video Tutorial

The steps above are summarized in this time-lapsed video I put together.

To accompany these love bird cookies, I included a birdcage cookie, a ribbon banner cookie, and a rose bundle in the shape of a heart.

You can find the birdcage cookie cutter and the ribbon banner cookie cutter in my shop. I've included design outlines for these two cookies in the downloadable template, as well.

If you're interested on how I created the rose bundle cookies, I'm planning on doing a separate, dedicated blog post for those alone. They were fairly simple to decorate and a breeze to whip up. Stay tuned in the near future for that tutorial.

Happy Valentine's Day!