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Hello, I'm making cookies for my sister-in-laws baby shower and I had a couple questions, any help is greatly appreciated!

1. When I finish icing the cookies should I refrigerate them or is it ok to leave them out until the next day when I wrap them up?

2. Do you prefer confectioner's sugar icing or royal icing for sugar cookies?

3. Have you ever heard of a food coloring paste? I used it today to try out instead of regular food coloring and it made my icing look really gritty. (i.e. orange icing with white gritty marks throughout)

Thank you so much bees!:)

I love baking!  (Cookies are my speciality, and sugar cookies are my favorite ones to make.) 

1) I freeze my cookies in tins or air tight containers.  I think refrigerating them would draw excessive moisture, but freezing them allows them to be at the proper consistancy.  You can freeze them up to a month in advance without a problem.  And it should not cause a problem to wait a day to freeze them. 

2)I prefer buttercream icing over royal icing.  But I think that they are both appealing. 

3) I use food coloring paste all the time, from your description, I'm going to guess that there may be a problem with your sugar.  If it's gritty and the colored icing has white specks in it then the problem is that the food coloring is unable to color the larger grits of sugar.  I took a cake decorating class once, and the expert told us to always use "Pure Sugar Cane" confectioner's sugar.  She said that store brands are often not made correctly and recommended "Domino" brand to us.  I know that there are other regional sugar brands that would also be Pure Sugar Cane, but I don't know what they are called.  Domino is the main brand name sugar available in my area.   If I remember correctly, she told us that some brands mix sugar and corn starch, and then the icing doesn't turn out.  I'm wondering if your sugar is a mix of sugar and starch or if it's just a problem with the sugar bits not wanting to break apart.  Sugar paste is just food coloring in a different form.  It's great to use when you want to be precise about your icing shades. 

Your cookies should be just fine in an airtight container for a day.

I love royal icing! I have worked with it many times and really like the results. The instructions for sugar cookies with royal icing on www.browneyedbaker.com are very helpful. www.bakeat350.blogspot.com has a lot of great ideas too.

The Wilton gel coloring works really well. I have read that the Wilton black and red aren't very tasty but there is another brand that you can use.

Definitely check out www.retailmenot.com if you plan to go to Michael's for any of your materials. They usually have coupons posted there.

Thanks for all the help ladies! I tried a new sugar cookie recipe and royal icing recipe and I liked both better! I will put the cookies in an airtight container. I have looked online to find tips for decorating, but it can still be really time consuming! I found that for the little details I can use a toothpick dabbed in the paste. When I made the royal icing and used the paste there was no grittyness! So I have a feeling it was the butter...not positive though. Luckily, my sister will be down a couple days before the baby shower and will help me to decorate all the cookies! I will try to take pics when I'm done to show you:) Thanks for the suggestions!