LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- A Louisville baker is getting national recognition after winning a cookie competition on the Food Network.

Courtney Yopp Norris is the winner of the "Christmas Cookie Challenge."

She said she applied for several years before being selected to compete.

Spoiler alert: this year she won the whole thing taking home a $10,000 check and a gold ornament trophy.

Celebrity judges include Ree Drummond, also known as The Pioneer Woman, and Eddie Jackson. Yopp Norris said they helped calm her nerves.

"I was so nervous. Like there's one thing to bake thousands of cookies in my own kitchen in chaos," she said. "It's another thing to have all the cameras on you, and then they're asking you questions, and you're trying to fix things when they break, being like Martha Stewart and MacGyver put together to try to make it work. And so I can't say enough nice things about the two celebrity judges that really make you feel at ease."

The challenge was shot back in April, so she has been keeping it a secret this whole time.

"It was a little difficult just to not tell first. I didn't tell that many people I went, so that made the keeping a secret a little bit easier," Yopp Norris said.

After the episode aired earlier this month, she posted some photos on social media and said she is incredibly grateful for the experience.

"Had I come home without the win, I would have still been so proud, just because of the difficulty level in the talent of the other bakers that you're you're competing with is so high, that I tell everyone, just getting on the show and doing it is an accomplishment in and of itself," she said.

She started The Pocket Bakery in 2018. She is currently not accepting custom cookie orders but she hosts decorating classes and sells cookie decorating kits.

She said she will put some of the money back into the bakery, but with three kids and the holidays it will mostly go towards the needs of her family.

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