Make Your Christmas Sugar Cookies Stand Out With These Simple Decorating Ideas (2024)

This is your never-fail basic sugar cookie recipe. Use it to make all your favorite ornaments, or try one of the innovative recipes below.

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These edible string lights are tied together with an extra-long piece of licorice.

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These pretty ginger-infused cookies are simple to make, and can be arranged into an absolutely stunning dessert-table centerpiece.

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This smart take on traditional Christmas tree cookies uses colored dough and the negative shapes to make delicious Linzer-style cookie sandwiches. Smucker's jelly or preserves are a good choice.

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Here's a fun way to address a gift—and it's edible! To create these sweet name tags, follow our recipe for sugar cookie dough, below. Then just form the cookies with a tag-shaped cutter, and use a small straw to punch a hole in the pointed end of each treat before baking.

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This easy-to-make dough can be turned into three different cookies, depending on what you're in the mood for. The chocolate ones are perfect for Santa.

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All you need to create these elegant snowflake cookies are different-sized cookie cutters and a light dusting of powdered sugar.

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Displayed in a clear-topped checkerboard box, bite-size shortbread cookies—dipped in fruity glazes, chopped nuts, and citrus zest—pass for tiny works of art. Bonus: The sturdy container can later hold other petite treasures like jewelry or sewing notions.

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Bavarian cookies called springerle are known for their distinctive flavor. The dough is rolled onto a floured surface, imprinted with clean, floured rubber stamps, dried overnight, and then baked.

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Simplify your holiday baking this season: With just one dough recipe, you can create dozens of distinctive cookies. During the holidays, an edible gift is always appreciated—and never returned!

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To make these, all you need are two different-colored doughs, a rolling pin, and a knife! Form one dough ball into a log, then wrap the rolled-out colored dough around it, chill, slice into cookies, and bake.

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This edible tic-tac-toe board makes a fun (and edible) Christmas game! To make it, simply bake squares of red-colored and plain cookie dough, then cut out some tiny h's and o's, and bake them off. The small letters will cook quickly, so keep an eye on the oven!

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Use a glass with a decorative bottom to press patterns into ready-made sugar cookie dough.

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These buttery delights are cute as, well, you know. Gather a stack together by threading ribbon through the buttonholes, and present the cookies in a perfectly sized papier-mâché box with a snowflake stenciled on the lid.

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Adorn your sweet snowmen with their own scarves, hats, and carrot noses by using the easy piping instructions included in the recipe.

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Your friends and family will be blown away that you made these elegant shortbread cookies yourself. Believe it or not, they're very easy to create!

Get the recipe at The Café Sucre Farine.

Use different varieties of sprinkles to decorate these soft, chewy sugar cookie trees and stars—that just happen to be gluten-free too!

Get the recipe at Ambitious Kitchen.

While the Santa decorations on these cookies are adorable, we also love all the Christmas spices working together in every bite, including cardamon, ginger, and even black pepper.

Get the recipe at Half Baked Harvest.

You can use this classy looking half-dipped technique on any cookie, but we think these extra chocolatey peppermint cookies are a great choice.

Get the recipe at Baker by Nature.

To make these adorable wreaths, the recipe gives instructions for sugared rosemary, which sounds so delicious paired with the other spices in this cookie.

Get the recipe at Half Baked Harvest.