Cupcake Paper Trees and Cookie Tip

Ever the penny pincher...I was looking for cookies to get maximum bang for my buck.

These Pillsbury looked really good, however, there were only 12 per package.

So I devised a plan to turn 2 packages (24) into 96 cookies! (2 for $5.00).

I found these at Wal Mart and they are very good!

I cut each cookie into fourths. (They were pretty big to begin with.)



I rounded the edges off and placed them about 1 1/2" apart on an ungreased cookie sheet.

When I finished, I had 95 cookies (I dropped one).
They are a little larger than vanilla wafers.

. I had put notes on the covered cookies which said, "NO!No!" and "Stay OUT!" so that nobody at my house would eat them before I took them to the shop for our open house Saturday.

I got busy with a customer and I directed her husband to the refreshment table and told him to  have a cookie...he said, "I wanted one but the note said "Stay out!" ... great public relations.

Next I had a fun craft that I thought you might enjoy.

Cupcake liner Christmas Trees

Gather supplies to make your cupcake paper trees:
Assorted cupcake papers, Styrofoam cones, pins and scissors.
I used a 40% off coupon at Michael's for the large cone which was originally $5.99...ridiculous.

Cut the bottom out of the paper.
 I wised up after a few minutes and cut lots of the bottoms out at the same time.

You will have a bottomless ruffle of paper with a slit in the middle.

Pin the ruffle around the cone. I pleated every once in a while to make it fit.
At first, it takes more than one ruffle to go all the way around.
continue from the bottom up until you have covered the cone.

This is the result. I added a  contrasting red to the bottom of the checked one. It looks like a little skirt.
The top should be pointed but these cones were flat on top, so I topped each tree with ribbon to hide the flat area.

The red and white polka dot papers were actually candy papers and were much smaller, but they were so cute I couldn't leave them behind at the store. It took a few more of them to cover the cone because of their diminutive size.

Cute, quick and I wish I could give credit to the originator of this idea.
I did use the idea from All Free Christmas Crafts.

Barney Cupcakette Cake

I am so old that I am now teaching children of former students!! Yikes! One of the teachers at my school is a former eighth grade student of mine, and I love her dearly. Last year her little girl turned two and was absolutely in love with Barney. My former student (now turned colleague) wanted a little something different for the party...not just the "run of the mill" cake. She had this great idea...which my teaching partner and I turned into reality!

She wanted tiny cupcakes for each two year old who attended the party...not regular sized ones, but the little tiny ones. Then she wanted the cupcakes made into a Barney shaped cake. Hmmmmm.....well, two cake mixes and 5 million cans of icing later we had done it. "Teaching partner" baked all 70 cupcakettes and I tinted and iced! The first teeny tiny cupcake Barney cake on the planet Earth was complete! Look at the cute scallops that were the result of edges of the cupcakettes...FYI: It took over 50 of the cupcakettes to make the cake.

It's almost Hallie's third birthday and I wanted to do a special post wishing her a VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY and hope she (and her mom and dad) will remember that we love her, too and we had a great time making Barney a reality cake for her!!

The above says it all!

I am linking up with Boogieboard Cottage and Beverly's Pink Saturday...use button on right to visit!

Blessings and cupcakes for everybody!