Hello Everyone! I am in charge of making 8 centerpieces for an event at my daughters' school and am considering making cookie bouquets. How far in advance can I bake and decorate the cookies. I use the NFSC recipe and Antonia74 royal icing (yum!) Any advice would be appreciated!

I don't use the NFSC recipe. But I will mix and cut my cookies up to 3 weeks in advance and store in the freezer. 3 days before the order is due I bake my cookies (still frozen, this helps to keep them from spreading, just add an additional 1-2 minutes on your baking time). If I have multiple colors then I also do my base coat of icing on the cookies. 2 days before the order is due I do any details on the base coat and finish decorating. 1 day before the order is due I either bag the order up, box, or bag and assemble boquets.

I have not frozen the cookies after decorated, but I have seen others mention they do. Hopefully someone will see this that does and can give you any information on that.

Oh.. just realized you are doing cookie boquets. I insert my sticks in the dough right after I pull them out of the oven and they are still warm. (so you don't have to worry about freezing them)

personally, I have a 5-day rule... no more than 5 days from making the dough to delivering. However, many people have said before that they have longer "rules of thumb" themselves.

As leily said, the cookies can be frozen, either before or after icing them.

Here are some previous threads on this exact topic that might help you figure out your timeline.

freezing cookies
http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-633905.html

freezing & using RI
http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-632656.html

freshness
http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-decorating-ftopict-660400-fresh.html

I agree with booniebakes, no more than 5 days.

Thank you all sooo much! This is very helpful! I will check out the other threads mentioned as well. Have a great evening!