Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until it is fluffy. This will take about 5 minutes. You can do this in a stand mixer or with a handheld mixer. I personally prefer to use the stand mixer.

Once the butter and powdered sugar are creamed together add the eggs and vanilla extract.

Mix all of the dry cookie ingredients in a separate bowl and whisk to mix everything together.

Then add the flour and other dry ingredients mixture to the butter and sugar mixture and mix well.

Put half of the freshly made dough between two sheets of parchment paper and roll it out to 1/4 inch thick.

Repeat with the rest of the dough.

Put the rolled dough including the parchment paper, on a cookie sheet and refrigerate for 10 minutes or longer. You want the dough to be cold.

Once the sugar cookie dough is chilled it is ready to cut using your pumpkin cookie cutter. After cutting all the cookies out, reroll the dough scraps and use the rest of it to cut out more cookies until you have no dough left.

Place cookies on a single layer with a little bit of space between them on a baking sheet and bake at 325° F for 10 -15 minutes.

Remove the cookies from the baking sheet and cool them on a cookie rack. Be sure the cookies are completely cooled before moving on to decorating them.

While the cookies are cooling make the royal icing.

Combine the sugar and meringue powder in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on low speed until well combined.

Stir in 2 tablespoons of the water.

Next, add a clear extract to make your frosting take on different flavors if you want to.

If the mixture is still crumbly add the rest of the water.

Mix on medium-low speed for 5 minutes.

Split the frosting into smaller bowls, you will need one bowl for each color you are going to make. For the turkey cookies you will need brown royal icing, red royal icing, orange royal icing, black royal icing and yellow royal icing. You will need 2 cups of brown royal icing, then make 1/8 cup of black icing. Divide the last of the icing into 3 equal parts of red, yellow, and orange.

Color icing with desired food colors by blending a drop of coloring into the icing. Gradually blend additional drops until you achieve the desired color.

Put the royal icing into a piping bag and do the outlines for all of your cookies.

Pipe an outline in brown around the turkey cookie edge and allow it to harden. Put the brown icing back into a bowl and add a small amount of water to make it 20 second icing and put it back in the piping bag and flood the outline of the cookie.

While the brown frosting is still wet use the red, yellow, and orange icing to add feathers on the left handside. You can use a frosting pick tool to spread the frosting out into the brown to give it more feather like look. The best way to do this is to make a straight line with the icing and then use the pic to spread it into the brown icing.

Use the red icing and make the gobbler on the right handside and the orange icinig to add the nose above the gobbler.

Use the black icing to add one eye.

Allow the icing to harden for about 30 minutes and then add the wing with the brown icing. Use the red, orange and yellow icing to add feathers to the wing. The best way to do this is to make a straight line with the icing and then use the pic to spread it into the brown icing.

Use the orange icing to add feet at the bottom of the cookie.

Allow the icing to harden completely before serving or storing.