I Nailed It!! How I Nailed My Very Own Creation

OK, before you ask "What the heck are those?!?", let me explain. You know how you go to the store and you see something that you don't need, but you buy it anyway because you just might need it…one day?

​Well, that happened to me this week. I went to the commissary and spotted some really neat orange and black Halloween straws and thought to myself: "Wow, maybe orange and black straws will be on the 'volunteer to bring' list for at least one of my daughters' first grade Halloween parties!"- I have two first graders and they are in two different classes.
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Reflecting on why I bought them in the first place, I can't figure out why it made any sense at all. Seriously? My reasoning was flawed from the start. Who the heck asks someone to bring 200 straws to any elementary school party?!? First of all, there aren't 200 kids in first grade and second of all I'm sure if there are drinks they're juice boxes that come with their own straws. But the orange and black straws are so neat I had to get them!
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Yesterday I had a thought. I am not super crafty. You won't find me posting anything craft related with 20 million hits on Pinterest, but I knew I had to come up with some way to use these cool looking straws.

Well...these are what I came up with! Aren't they amazing?!? Now you can ask me what the heck are they? They are anything you want them to be; thanks for asking! They can be ghouls, they can be mouthless goblins, they can even be ghosts with straw arms if you want! Whatever you want, they can be. The important thing is they are crafted out of the Halloween primary colors: white, black, and orange!

So I bet you want to know how I made these bad boys don't you? Well I am not a big fan of food dyes, especially the red and blue variety so I went for the Pillsberry Moist Supreme Yellowcake. It claims to make 24 cupcakes; I eked out 17, but that's only because I over filled the first twelve cupcake wrappers. I used a couple of large free-range brown eggs and was about to use coconut oil instead of the half a cup of vegetable oil the instructions called for then it dawned on me!! Even though it's not a nut free school there might be a kid allergic to coconut. So, I put the brakes on that idea and whipped out the Great Value (Walmart brand) vegetable oil I had on hand. I seldom use vegetable oil and I'm not a fan of the Great Value variety, but I figured it would probably taste better than using olive oil in the cupcakes and be better than being the cause of an allergic reaction.

Now for the eyes. I had milk-chocolate chips on hand, but I also had raisins. I figured if there was going to be any inkling of "healthly for you" in this snack I better opt for the Sun Maid raisins. The raisins worked perfectly as eyes. Look at them closely. See, some of them are mean and glaring, some of them are sad looking, and some of them just are.

Finally, I cut down the straws to craft some arms with moveable joints for each of the mouthless goblins and voilà!! I'd created the perfect snack edition to any spooky party!

They might not look like a Pinterest hit, but I can assure you that they were tasty. I should know since I ate the runt of the batch and took the remaining 16 to school. You know what?? I don't recall seeing ANYONE actually eat one...humm...that's a bit suspect because I got both of my baking pans back from both classrooms...empty. Strange. I'm sure someone enjoyed my cupcakes.

​Can't say what went through their heads when they reached for one to eat, but I know once it hit their lips (I used pre-made cream cheese icing ) it was delish, and left them begging for more!! Those raisins on that icing was the bomb!!

Nailed it? Yes. Yes, I did!

I'd love to hear about a time your creation was beyond the standard for creativity. Drop me a note below and tell me all about it!

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Eenie Meenie Miney Moe

Raisins will make these cup cakes healthier!