Building a Sandcastle

For an Ariel themed party I made a sandcastle cake. I had a blast building it and the best part about this one was that it was edible.  The towers were made by stacking up different sized cupcakes and topping them off with an upside down sugar cone. It took me awhile to figure out how to add the birthday girl's name to it. I thought about how when we go to the beach the kids always take a stick and draw in the sand so I tried to do the same to the cake. It didn't stand out enough so instead I ended up breaking up pretzel sticks and laying them down on the cake. I loved how it turned out. 

Caramel Surprise

These are so yummy! They're a chocolate cupcake with caramel inside, topped with a dark chocolate buttercream frosting. K loves it when I make them for her to bring to school. She doesn't tell anyone about the caramel inside so they end up discovering it after they take their first bite. I've also made them with a small amount of sea salt on top of the caramel and icing. It adds a great flavor to it.  

On Dasher, on Dancer....

These reindeer cupcakes were one of the two different designs that I made for the holiday this year. I found several different ways to make them but ended up going with this version. I used melting chocolate to make the antlers, tootsie rolls for the ears, mini vanilla wafers and M&M's for the nose, and white M&M's for the eyes. Next year I hope to add Santa Claus and make it look like their pulling his sleigh. 

Holiday Lights

This is the other design I made this year. I love holiday lights and end up putting up what seems like a bizzilion of them every year, so when I found this design I knew it was perfect! They turned out to be one of the fastest and easiest cupcakes to make too. I used graham crackers to make the light bulb shape. I originally thought about using marshmallows but they weren't big enough and were harder to shape. I also used red gumdrops, red licorice, and chewing gum to make the plug.  

Shark Attack

K loves animals and picked out this design for me to make for her 8th birthday. I ended up making cupcakes for her to bring to school and a cake for her party. The cupcakes have either a shark, a shark-bitten life preserver or fish on them while the cake has all three. Their favorite part, the sharks.