A Very Disney Christmas

I didn't go to Disney for Christmas this year (I never have, though it is a goal of mine!) but I did get a lot of Disney magic in the form of presents!  First of all, my brother and brother-in-law picked out the cutest Disney jewelry for me:

Mickey and Minnie earrings (too cute!!):

Mickey rhinestone and glass necklace filled with tiny gems, on a long gold chain:

They also got me other cute things, but this is strictly Disney today :)  My friend Jenny got me this adoooorable Mickey tea-for-one teapot!  She ordered it from JAPAN!  They don't have cute stuff like this over here, and I absolutely adore Tokyo Disney.  Sigh.  I'll be back some day!

She also got me these awesome Elsa socks!  Haha so cute:

Santa left a Winnie the Pooh Tsum-Tsum in my stocking, along with Frozen Band-Aids!

My parents got me this beautiful Alex+Ani bracelet that I saw on my last Disney trip and hadn't picked up for myself.  I checked online after returning from my trip and it wasn't available!  It was a park exclusive.  Well, since then it has become available on the website and my parents snagged it for me :)

They also got me this Chip mug since I became obsessed with Mrs. Potts after making those cookies of her a couple posts ago!

I got Silly Symphony and Toy Story Vinylmations:

And I gasped when I opened this one!  I had told my parents there was this really cute frame I liked in Hollywood Studios on my last visit, and I thought, "you don't need this."  Just like the Alex+Ani bracelet, I looked it up online but to no avail.  My dad found it on some Mouse Ears website and ordered it for me!  I have the perfect picture from that park to frame.  I'm so excited, and I was so touched!

And lastly, I got my dad tickets for us to go see The Little Mermaid at the White Plains Performing Arts Center!  It was last night, and it was wonderful!  I saw the Broadway production 5 years ago and this one was just as amazing!  Of course it was a smaller scale, but they did some great staging and production work.  The orchestra was wonderful, and the props and costumes were so colorful and fun! And of course all the performers had Broadway-quality voices!!  It is running till January 4 so if you live in or near Westchester, NY then I definitely recommend attending one of their last performances!!

Halloween Cupcakes and Nails

Disney was holding a "Haunt Your Disney Side" contest this October to win a midnight party at the Haunted Mansion in Disney World, and a one-night stay in Cinderella Castle!  The categories for entry were costumes, decorations, desserts and pumpkin carvings.  My entry didn't win, but I had fun making it!  I chose Mickey and Minnie Halloween Cupcakes, and this is how it went!

I started with some cute Halloween cupcake wrappers from Michaels:

Of course they weren't the foil kind so the oil bled through and the designs weren't very clear anymore. At least they were fun for me to look at while I baked!

I bought all the candy for decorating at Fuzziwig's--Jellybeans, sour candy tape, mini M&Ms, candy bones, and much more that I tried for ears, noses and eyes… but the candy I listed is all I ended up using!  Oh, and this TINY CONE with marshmallow that was just TOO CUTE not to buy… and I used it as a witch hat, as you'll see below :)  (Do you like my Frankenstein nails?  I have more Disney-ish nails at the end of this post!)

Now, if this were my cupcake blog, I'd go through many more steps with pictures, but it's more about the finished product here on my Disney blog, so here's Mickey (pre-vampire):

Oreo ears, mini M&Ms glued with frosting to vanilla jellybeans, a black licorice jellybean for his nose, sour candy tape cut into a tongue shape, and frosting.  There is no frosting around his face because the chocolate cupcake itself was the perfect color!

And here's Minnie, much the same except for her chocolate-sprinkles eyelashes (and pre-witch)!

Here is a side-view of Minnie (with her witch hat on) just to show you how funny it looked when it wasn't at just the right angle!

It was meticulous work making their faces--I used an offset spatula and vanilla frosting dyed to just the right color (some yellow, a teensy bit of red), and spread it on in the face shape.  As you can see, each "mouse" was actually 3 cupcakes.  So I didn't make more than the two I needed for my photo submission!  I made some fun Halloween-y "background" cupcakes with what frosting and sprinkles I had left:

So here it is, my submission for the "Haunt Your Disney Side" contest!  Like I said, I didn't win, but it was fun making this, and now I can put it in my scrapbook :)  Mickey has 2 little white-frosting fangs, a candy bone as his vampire bow tie, and sour candy tape as his vampire-cape collar!  Minnie has a frosted and sprinkled cone as her witch hat, with sour candy tape as the ribbon! 

And, as I promised, here is a picture of the nails I did for Halloween: poison apple nails!  All using nail polish and a dotting tool!  Hope you had a happily haunting Halloween!