In my last post, Creative Cupcakes (Little Shop of Horrors), I experimented with fondant. I admit it. It’ll be awhile before I make cupcakes as elaborate as those again. If you want quick and easy favors, give-aways, congratulations goodies or party activities, these DIY Candy Jars are a cinch to put together.
In lieu of gift cards for my middle schooler’s friends, I decided to make my own Congratulations Goodies. I already owned the mason jars, ordered the candy, and asked my in-house graphic designer (aka Hubby) to print labels.
The result? Sweet gifts for a creepy show–creepy in a good way!
Hon, you know what this means? I LOVE a theme!
Here’s what you need to make your own Quick and Easy Candy Jars:
Mason Jars–available at craft stores
Candy–candy and colors to go with your theme, I used green M & M’s and Frankford Gummy Body Parts Candy
Labels and Ribbon (optional)
That’s It. Happy DIY’ing! (and enjoy some show pics)
Gummy body parts.Labels.Fill the jars.
Little Shop of Horrors’ man-eating plant, Audrey II. See what I mean by creepy?Seymour and Urchins on Skid Row.
A Sun Star plant along with Brussels sprouts and cabbages welcome theatre goers. “Audrey II’s” and photo care of my friend Lynn.
LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS + CAST PARTY = AN AWESOME THEME
Hon, you know how I love a theme?
There’s someone who loves themes even MORE THAN ME!
I asked Lynn, mom of “Seymour” in our middle school’s production of the macabre musical Little Shop of Horrors, to show me how to work with fondant. We tag-teamed baked and decorated 100 cupcakes for the cast party. My Plus-One (as in Triplets Plus One) was an Urchinette. She wore a gold sequined dress and teased hair (shout out to Emma’s grandma) to Doo-Wop her heart out along with the other Urchins. The cast and crew’s hard work paid off.
The show was excellent! Our kids were stars! What fun!
Creative Cupcakes
Here’s how we made edible “Audrey II’s,” the mysterious man-eating plant in LSOH.
Step 1. Gather your ingredients. Rather than make fondant from scratch, we used Fondarific. Supplies included cake mix, baking cups, canned icing, Wilton icing, food coloring, rubber gloves, romaine lettuce, spoons,wax paper, Wilton Decorating Bags and Tips, Swedish Fish candy and Cake Boxes.
Icing and Fondarific.Baking cups and food coloring.
Step 2. Prepare fondant decorations. After the Fondarific was warmed and softened, rubber gloves were donned, and food coloring was mixed in by hand. Small balls of fondant were pressed onto spoons. Then romaine leaves rubbed onto fondant created leaf impressions. After carefully lifting fondant leaves off of spoons, they were layered with wax paper and left to set. (I put them in a container covered with foil, not refrigerated, overnight.) The leaves needed to be stiff enough to stand up, but pliable enough to form LSOH’s man-eating plant.
Soften fondant. *Put on rubber gloves BEFORE blending food color into it.Form leaves–or whatever shape you want–and let them set.
Step 3. Bake cupcakes according to package directions.Food coloring was also mixed with vanilla canned icing then spread on cooled cupcakes. Icing the cupcakes kept them fresh while the fondant leaves set overnight and formed a base to work on.
Step 4. Assemble Audrey II’s (or whatever decoration goes with your theme). Lynn said that, though the canned icing was good for a base, the stiffer Wilton icing made better leaves surrounding the “plants” and fangs on the Audrey II’s. She used Wilton Tip #103 to form surrounding leaves and Tip #4 for the fangs. Mini Swedish Fish candies became tongues. Eww and yum!
Assemble cupcake decorations.
“Whatever you do, don’t feed the plants!”Cupcakes with bite!
Bmore energy 