How to make it:
To the bowl of a stand mixer, add cold, cubed butter and sugar, beat on medium speed until smooth and well combined. Mix in the eggs one at a time until combined. Add vanilla and almond extracts and mix.

To a mixing bowl, add dry ingredients and whisk to combine. When measuring flour, fluff with a fork then spoon into a measuring cup. This will keep it from compacting and adding too much. Add half of the dry ingredients to the wet and beat on low, working up to a medium speed. Add remaining dry and beat just until combined. Dough will feel like playdoh consistency. Remove the bowl and refrigerate the dough for 30 minutes.

Turn out the dough onto work surface and roll dough to a thickness of about 1/4 inch. Flouring the work surface and rolling pin is helpful, or try rolling dough out between 2 pieces of wax or parchment paper.

Cut into shapes and place cut out dough pieces on nonstick or parchment lined baking sheets. Refrigerate for 15 minutes while preheating the oven to 375° F degrees.

Bake cookies for 7-8 minutes, or until edges appear set. Cookies will not look golden on the top, so don't over bake.

Remove from oven and let cookies sit on baking sheet for 2 minutes, then transfer to a wire cooling rack and cool completely.

Re-roll scraps to make more cookies; place dough back in the fridge in between batches. When continuing to bake other batches, make sure the baking sheet has cooled to touch. The heat of the pan will melt the butter too quickly, which will result in an inconsistently baked cookie. 

Decorate with frosting when cooled.

Tip: To keep the dough a consistent thickness, these dough leveler sticks are a huge help!