Pumpkin Cupcakes You HAVE to Try

As our big week o’ pumpkins comes to a close (TGIF!) we wanted to leave you all with a little something sweet for the weekend.

When we came across this recipe on Jones Design Company, we knew we had to give it a go. And we are SO glad we did (even though hers turned out much prettier than ours!). These pumpkin cupcakes are the perfect complement to the season—and they meet all the requirements for what makes these Copy Cat girls giddy: they’re easy to make, inexpensive, and they taste AMAZING.

 Take these to your Halloween parties this weekend or to your in-laws over Thanksgiving and you’ll be the hit of the gathering. These cupcakes look and taste like something straight out of Martha Stewart’s kitchen but only require the effort of a Betty Crocker mix.

The homemade cream cheese icing is simple and sweet and sure to induce lots of bowl-scraping and finger-licking action.

Topped with a candy corn (or perhaps a candy pumpkin if you have them!) these cupcakes just scream fall.

Sweeten your Saturday and Sunday with these delights. We promise you won’t regret it!

We hope you have a safe and Happy Halloween weekend!

EasyPeasy Paper Pumpkins

Sometimes you have to crawl before you walk. You need to get one simple thing right before you can tackle bigger (and better!) things. That’s exactly what this project is for! Consider it your crafting ego boost.

These pretties got us thinking this is just what we needed to get a little bit of confidence we tackled a big and scary project like...a wreath!

If you’re like us (crafty wannabes), you have tons of pretty scrap booking paper lying around. I had grand dreams once of scrapbooking all of my college memories, but who was I kidding? I never touched that paper. I decided it was high time I put it to good use -- and just in time for Halloween!

The hardest of this project is picking your paper. There are just so many great options out there--and who says all pumpkins have to be orange? We certainly don’t think so.

Once you have your paper, its time to channel your inner Edward Scissorshands. Lots of cutting to be done here, but this handy fellow helps A LOT!

We cut both ½ inch and ¼ inch pieces. It took about 8 ½ inch pieces and 12 ¼ inch pieces.

Take your long-lost hole punch and punch a hole in each end.

One strip at a time, loop the holes through a metal brad. (yes, Michael’s has these, but take if from us, they are hard to find!)

Keep going, until you have the desired fullness. Then just close the brad.

We chose to use raffia (which you can buy on the cheap almost anywhere crafts or wrapping paper is sold. if you happen to have an old hula skirt laying around, that could work too!) for the bows on top of our cute pumpkins, but we imagine lots of things would be adorable: ribbon, scrap fabric, and jute would all be adorable!

Drop a bit of glue from your trusty glue gun, attach the bow and you’re all set.

Who knew crafting could be so easy? Certainly not this girl.

So here's tonight's Copy Cat Run Down:

Total Cost: $8 ($3 for brads and $5 for raffia, but we have enough to make a whole patch of pumpkins) We already had the paper on hand so it was FREE!

Total Time: 5 minutes per pumpkin, maybe less if you’re extra speedy.

Would we do this craft again? Duh! We want to fill them in every nook and cranny of our houses. Watch out Autumn 2011 we are totally ready for you!

Credit: There are tons of these beauties in the Blogosphere but here are a few of our favorites.

The Easiest Monogrammed Pumpkin You Never Knew You Could Always Make

Once upon a time we lived in a world where Mod Podge didn’t exist (to us). It was very sad and full of woe and all we had were run-of-the-mill plain-old carved pumpkins. The End.  Luckily for us, this story has a happy ending!  Crafters, we’d like to introduce you to Brown Paper Packages. It’s okay—we’ll wait while you dry off the drool that’s running down your chin. Kierste and Angela are some crafty, crafty ladies, and from the moment we first laid eyes on their blog we’ve been itching to get our hands on some of their ideas.  

With Halloween just around the corner, it was time to make the annual trip to the pumpkin patch to pick out a bright orange beauty to grace our home this year. And also, to take adorable pictures of a pretty cute baby frolicking amongst nature’s autumnal bounty:

You’re welcome for that.

At any rate, once we got our picks home, it was time to make a game-time decision. To carve or not to carve? While the traditional route is good, messy fun I wanted to do something a little different this year. And once I saw the monogrammed pumpkins on Brown Paper Packages the decision was an easy one to make. 

The first step was to decide what we wanted to go on our pumpkins and to create a stencil on the computer.  I opted for a “P”, which is the initial of our last name, and a lowercase “a” on the baby pumpkin that we picked for our daughter Addie. Using Microsoft word I found a font that I liked, blew it up to the size I wanted and then printed and cut out the letters.  Here is what the “P” looked like hot off the presses:

Using the stencil as a guide, I cut out the letters onto scrapbook paper (that I already had on hand—score!).  They were a little rough around the edges, but it’s okay.  Trust me.

Now, this next step required another crafting “first” for me.  Internet, it was my maiden Mod Podge voyage.

I put a layer of Mod Podge on my pumpkins in the place I wanted to position my monograms and then carefully placed on the cut-out letters. Here is the only tricky part: Just be careful that your letters lay flat and don’t have any folds or bubbles in them. The Mod Podge is pretty sticky and once your paper is on--it’s on. Since I am both new to this and impatient, I ran into this issue a couple of times. I was able to smooth the places out with my finger and it looks okay. If you are a perfectionist about that kind of stuff, then you may want to watch out.

Once the letters were in place, we painted on another layer of Mod Podge to seal our monograms in.

Now, if I hadn’t seen the results of this stuff elsewhere I may have gotten a little nervous at this step. The layer of white glue-like goo was not the look I had in mind, so it was comforting to know for sure that it would eventually dry clear.

And after we let them dry all night- voila! Adorable, easy-peasy monogrammed pumpkins.  I loved them so much that I couldn’t bear to banish them out to the porch where I couldn’t look at them all the time, so they now sit on their place of honor on the hearth of our fireplace:

And Miss Addie was a big fan of her “A” pumpkin as well.

I love them. A lot. So easy—even a copy cat can do it!

And if fresh pumpkins aren’t really your thing—we’re pretty sure this would work just as great on the fake pumpkins you can buy at your local craft store. Which means you can use them year after year! (And here’s a hint: those pumpkins should be going on clearance soon if they aren't already!)

Here’s The Copy Cat Rundown:

Total Cost: Pumpkins from local church’s pumpkin patch:-$8 Mod Podge: $5.99 (but I have lots and lots left for future crafting) Scrap book paper: $0.60- and we still have scraps to use another time Sponge brush: $0.99 (but we washed it out and plan to re-use it)

Total Time:  Not including the overnight drying time (or the technical difficulties I had with my printer)- 15 minutes

Would we do this craft again?: Absolutely. It was easy, cost effective, and adorable. No pumpkin is safe!

Credit: Brown Paper Packages get 100% of the credit. I’m sure this isn’t the last time you’ll see these girls taking credit at the Copy Cat finish line.

Check back tomorrow for Natalie’s paper pumpkin delights. You’re gonna love them—and maybe even want to copy cat a few of you own. 

Pottery Barn Pumpkins (On A Pumpkin Spice Latte Budget!)

There are a lot of things to love about this time of year. The crisp air, the gorgeous colors of the fall foliage, the return of the Pumpkin Spice Latte at Starbucks….the list could go on and on. For me, one of the best things about this time of year is the opportunity to bring the essence of the season inside my home.  It’s like the prelude to Christmas: a chance to ease into the season of making your home warm and cozy and festive without quite as much fuss (and work).  And if you take a tour through my house, you’ll find that at the heart of my fall decor a common theme: pumpkins.

Pumpkins are super versatile when it comes to decor: You can get a shape, size, or color to fit almost any room in your house.  For example, I have a white ceramic one in my kitchen, grapevine pumpkins in my dining room, and silver pumpkins in my den (more on those later!).  Pumpkins also give you a lot of bang for your buck. They can take you from September right up until you trim the tree after Thanksgiving (as long as you resist carving a spooky face on the front!).  Suffice it to say: pumpkins are awesome and if you don’t have any in your house, you need to remedy that situation STAT.

This year, I was eager to add to my ever-growing pumpkin collection but my budget was not (read: I had a baby this past year. Kid is EXPENSIVE.) So I started scrolling through blogland looking for ways to pumpkin-up without spending a lot of dough.  I found a lot of great projects that I was eager to take on, and tonight, I want to share one of my favorites.

One of the first lessons I learned from my craftier counterparts was quite simple: spray paint is a budget-conscious crafter's best friend. A can of spray paint allows you to breathe new life into something on the cheap. It yields high impact results with very little investment. Thanks to Melissa over at 320 Sycamore, Natalie and I were tipped off to a sale on spray paint at Michael’s. We raced right over and snagged up two cans of Valspar’s Metal Spray Paint in Silver.  And I knew EXACTLY what I wanted to do with it. 

Let me go ahead and warn you: I am a little bit obsessed with pottery barn. However, I am less than enchanted with PB’s prices.  I had admired these beauties from afar for quite some time and I had seen a few crafty ladies’ takes on them. 

Armed with three mini pumpkins I had picked up earlier at Dollar Tree (for $1 each, duh!)  and our newly-acquired can-o-goodness, I set about making my first attempt at a Pottery Barn Look-for-Less craft.  And hey, with only $5 invested in the whole project (including the can of spray paint which can be used for many, many more projects) I figured I didn’t have much to lose!

We started our project with this set of lovelies:

 

And with a quick coat of white spray paint (to act as a base), they were already looking much better!

After the coat of white dried, we gave them a quick coat of the silver.

And this—this is the moment that I fell in love. You guys, this silver spray paint is MAGIC. It went on so smooth and covered so well. It was absolute instant gratification. I was immediately dreaming up what else I could cover in this glorious substance.  I mean, can you imagine the Christmas craft potential of this stuff?

At any rate after one quick coat for touching up, we were good to go. I had the Pottery Barn look I was going for the price of, well, a pumpkin spice latte.  And I had the perfect spot for them on the hearth in my den:

So here’s the Copy Cat Rundown:

Total Cost: $5 (if you count the spray paint, which I still have PLENTY of)

Total Time: 15 minutes for spraying (including drying time between coats) then another hour to let them dry completely before moving them inside

Would we do this craft again?: Are you kidding? At this point, I’m lucky my entire house isn’t covered in this stuff. If there’s a turkey I can spray silver, then my thanksgiving decorations are SET.

Credit: For this project, there isn’t really one blogger who showed this craft. However, there are plenty of crafters out there that have taken inexpensive pumpkins and turned them into something fabulous. Our favorites? These blue beauties over at Tater Tots and Jello and The puffy paint/spray painted pumpkins that Young House Love created.

With Halloween a week away, and pumpkin season in full swing, we’ve got lots more pumpkiny goodness to bring you this week. Check back for the easiest monogrammed pumpkin you never knew you could make and paper pumpkins that are so sweet and simple they’ll have you buying out the scrap book paper section of your local craft store immediately!