Ornament Cupcakes

My siblings and I tackled a dessert project for our ladies meeting that was loads of Christmasy fun! It was so much fun, in fact, that one of my brothers (I won't say which one) even volunteered to help us without being asked. Wowzers! For a member of the male species to volunteer to cook in our house...well, lets just write it down, folks.

Here is the original inspiration photo, via....wait for it.....Pinterest, of course! (And here is the link to my Christmas board, in case any of you missed it before. Keep your eye on it, its a-changing all the time!)

                                                                                           Source: Uploaded by user via Nicole on Pinterest

Pretty stinkin' cute idea, is it not? I thought it would make a fun, festive dessert for our ladies meeting, so we tried our hand at it. I bought these supplies to make the embellishments for the top:

Rachel made holes in the Reese's by poking a hole and then widening it with a knife. That was the easy part.

I undertook the task of breaking the pretzels to form hooks, and let me just tell ya, it was anything but easy. I don't know how they got the perfect looking ones in the Pinterest picture. I had looked at the large pretzels in the store, but they didn't look very "hookish," so I settled for the small ones. Still, it wasn't easy!

Here are some duds...and yeah, that wasn't even all of them! It was hard to break/cut them in just the right spot without ruining the hook I wanted.

After I finally got enough hooks, my mom said, "You know, mini candy canes would have been cute for that, too." Um, thanks mom. YOU'RE A LITTLE LATE!!!! Maybe next year. (That would be pretty stinkin' cute, don't you think?)

For the cupcake part, I just made a normal chocolate cake recipe from a box (don't throw stones) and a white frosting recipe that my mom had. Just standard stuff. It didn't really matter how they tasted anyway, these are all about the presentation. ;)

My willing helpers!

Rachel did the frosting...

Justin did the sprinkles...

... and as much taste-testing as he could sneak in. :)

Carrie put the tops on (while I was still feverishly trying to make the hooks).

I personally think they came out really cute! Just think how much better they would have looked with a mini candy cane! (Swoon) It was a fun, easy project that everyone enjoyed.