Minion Cupcakes!

I've been on a baking roll lately!

I recently had an order for minion cupcakes. I had seen photos floating around Pinterest and knew that these cupcakes could be done fairly easily and look so cute!

What You Need:

• blue cupcake liners
• cupcakes of your flavor choice
• yellow frosting
• brown or black frosting for piping
• giant marshmallows cut in thirds
• brown m&ms 

What To Do:

1.  bake your cupcakes in your blue liners
2.  let them cool completely
3. tint your white frosting yellow, or use store bought yellow frosting. spread a thin layer of frosting on your cooled cupcakes 
4. depending on what minion you're making - you'll use one marshmallow slice or two. stick them right on the frosting toward the top half of the cupcake
   
5. take a brown m&m. place a dot of frosting on the "m" side and place that side down onto the marshmallow slice(s)
   
6. take your brown or black frosting and draw straps coming out of the marshmallows to the end of the cupcake
7. take your brown or black frosting and make a cute little mouth
   
8. i wish i had some witty or cute minion quote to make, but i don't. soooo, enjoy!!

The birthday boy loved these! I loved the way they turned out. I actually have an order for 4 dozen later this month. I'll be a minion making machine!

Mermaid First Birthday Party!

My sweet niece Hanaly (hawn-uh-lee) turned one a few weeks ago and we had her party this last weekend.

I had a lot of fun putting things together for her mermaid celebration and everything turned out so cute! She is a little ball of sunshine and I love her to pieces.

Decorations:

• lanterns from Target
• banner from Target
• plates, napkins, cups and silverware from Target 
• sea shells collected over the years
• printables found in the depths of the internet 
• plastic sea shell plates from Oriental Trading 

Mermaid Munchies:

• clam shell cookies (nilla wafers, frosting, and sixlet pearls)
• seaweed skewers (grapes)
• flip flip cookies (nutter butters with frosting straps and sprinkle accents)
• fish and chips (potato chips and goldfish crackers)
• submarine sandwiches (Togo's sandwiches)
• sea foam floats (root beer floats) 
• star fish (rice krispies)
• beach themed smash cake 

I was in charge of the various sweet things, decorations and the smash cake. Surprise! ;)

Let me start by saying, those super smooth ombre cakes found on Pinterest are hard work! Next time, I need a cake turn table and different frosting. And maybe some unofficial practice.

The rest of the munchies were super fun and easy to make! Fun and easy are two of my favorite things. I'm an over thinker, worrier, and planner - so I like to keep things as easy as possible.

I had a mermaid themed birthday party last year that I never  blogged about. I'm a pro now! This theme will never get old. I think it would be super cute to do a mermaid/pirate theme. You could have so much fun with that.

The Easiest Candy Corn Icing Ever!

I'm in full Halloween mode over here, you guys! This past weekend, J and I went to visit our old roommates in Monterey. Lucky for me, my BFF loves Halloween as much as I do. On Saturday, we decided to bake cookies and watch the Hollywood Tower of Terror on DVD. $7.99 at Target with a cartwheel coupon!

We didn't want to make plain old sugar cookies and we may have picked up a few bags of candy corn on said Target trip. Soooo, ta daaaaa!

CANDY CORN ICED SUGAR COOKIES.

This is sugar on sugar on sugar and we're okay with that.

Use any sugar cookie recipe you want. Bagged, boxed, homemade, whatevs! The icing is all that matters on this one.

snap chat sneak peek ;)

We straight up dumped candy corn into a double boiler and stirred until they melted. It was a slow start, but once they started melting it was quick! We added a few splashes of cream to create icing consistency.

appetizing orange goop, I know.

This was really a brilliant idea on our part. Most icings are 99.9% sugar anyway, so this was perfection! These aren't outrageously sweet or anything, so don't be scared off! We drizzled our icing because we weren't sure how good these would be. You could most definitely spread a thing layer on the cookie and add some festive sprinkles! That's my plan for next time. Also, we pushed a piece of candy corn into some of the cookies for a fun surprise!

Now, let's take a poll. Do you love candy corn? Or hate it? I bet you can guess what side we're on!

DIY Halloween Costumes - Mike and Sully

We scare because we care! Straight up, I love Monsters Inc. Annnnd so does my best friend. She's Mike and I'm Sully. We dressed up for Mickey's Halloween Party a couple weeks ago and we decided to go in costume. Obvi!

Beth was Mike. (surprise)  Her costume was perfection. Below is the list of items she used to put her costume together.

•  an over-sized sweatshirt and dyed it lime green (Tulip brand dye)
• felt for the eyeball and smile
• green beanie
• horns were actually plastic squash covered in felt from the craft store. how brilliant is that?
• lime green converse 

waddup snap chat?

I was Sully. (surprise) Below is the list of items I used to put my costume together.

• a white fur vest from Target that I dyed teal (Tulip brand dye)

• purple acrylic paint + textile medium for the spots + a giant round ish sponge

• a tail made of feather boas

• a black headband
• horns were actually red devil horns painted with a mix of tan and white paint

• pastel purple lips for funsies
• silver sparkle toms because yes 

snapchat for the win...again!

Our costumes ended up being fairly simple to make and turned out so cute! I've seen many different variations of these costumes online, but none were exactly what we wanted.

TIP: If you mix acrylic paint with fabric medium it makes a permanent fabric paint! An employee at Hobby Lobby told me that! It worked perfectly for my spots.

 What are you being for Halloween this year? Do you DIY your costumes?

Disneyland at Halloweentime 2015 // Anaheim, CA

I looooove Disneyland. I'm no expert, but I'm hoping to be on that level some day! I've gone twice in 4 months, so I guess that's a start!

I recently went to Disneyland while it was decorated for Halloween. You can read all about my experience at Mickey's Halloween Party here. This year was a unique year to go because it's also the 60th anniversary. This was my first time going in September. (I heard this year is less Halloweeny then usual because of the anniversary, but I couldn't tell you!)

this is in California Adventure

The Halloween + 60th decorations were so pretty/cute/lovely. It was balls hot though! (I'm a lady, I swear.)

I wanted to share all the photos I took, so even if you can't make it to the park this year, you'll still get to enjoy the decorations!

Let the photo dump commence! (again with the I'm a lady thing)

this adorably delicious cake pop

These Disney pumpkins adorn the gates right before you enter Disneyland! 

those leaves are her bow. i die.

that diamond anniversary castle though!!!

even the lamps are all decked out! 

That giant pumpkin on Main Street was almost too much for me to handle! It was like a real life Halloweentown. (my second favorite Halloween movie ever)


What's your favorite time of the year to visit Disneyland or Disney World? I'm thinking I need to make a Christmas trip next year.

Mickey's Halloween Party // Disneyland 2015

loved the way the castle looked!

For those of you who aren't Disney fanatics or just don't know what this lovely party is all about, here's the DL on DL: (get it, get it???)

• tickets start at $69 - the closer you get to Halloween, the higher the price
• the event is from 6pm-11pm or 7pm-12am. if you don't have a Halloween party ticket, you will be asked to leave the park (so exclusive ;) )
• costumes are allowed and encouraged
• trick or treating is available for all ages 

I had the pleasure of attending Mickey's Halloween Party on September 28th. I went with my dad, little sister, and best friend. None of us had ever been to the park during Halloween time and we had no idea what to expect!

IT WAS SO MUCH FUN. From the very second you walk in, to the very second you leave you are surrounded by all things Halloween. The crowds are fairly small. The villains are out for pictures ALL NIGHT LONG.

The lines for rides are non existent. We walked straight on to every ride. Everybody is in costume and everyone is so friendly! Even the employees wear special Halloween outfits. There are trick or treat "paths" that you walk along. Kids and grown ups alike get tons of candy, apples, carrots and craisins! I thought that was really cool.

Spooky Tom Sawyer's island!

I think walking onto rides without having to wait in line is worth the $69 in itself. However, everything about the event was perfection. It seems like you're at a giant block party with all your friends. Music is blaring throughout the park and spooky projections are all over the walls of the buildings.

night parties = terrible picture quality

Beth (my bff) and I dressed up like Mike and Sully from Monsters Inc. Our costumes are homemade and I'll share how we made them later this week!

Maddie, my dad, me!

If you ever have the chance to go, DO IT. Dress up. Grab a free trick or treat bag and enjoy the fun.

Have you ever been? If so, in California or Florida?? I would love to hear about your experience!