Happy 4th of July!

Good afternoon!  I hope you're all having a great holiday!!  My sweetie and I played golf early this morning, trying to beat the heat.  We're headed to a bar-b-que with some friends this evening and to see a fireworks show.  I made some Cookies and Cream cupcakes to take with us.  I found this recipe on Pinterest.  You can see the recipe I used here.  I made some cupcake toppers with images from the Stand and Salute cartridge to make them a little more festive.  I didn't want to use glitter on the toppers (I was worried some glitter would fall off onto the cupcakes), so I used white and Clear Star Sakura gel pens to try to 'bling' up the images a little.

I'm going to enter these into the challenges over at Die Cuttin Divas and Fantabulous Cricut.  The challenge at Die Cuttin Divas is a color challenge with a bonus - use red, white and blue and as a bonus add a patriotic symbol.  I don't think my fireworks images are patriotic, but I got the colors!  The challenge at Fantabulous Cricut is Kaboom! Firework Celebration - make a project with a firework, sparkler or other big boom.

Thanks for coming by to take a look and I hope you all have a fabulous and safe 4th of July!!

Recipe:
Cardstock from Recollections
Firework and fire cracker from Stand and Solute cut at 2 inches
White and Clear Star Sakura gel pens

Cake Ingredients:
1 Devil's Food boxed cake mix, prepared as instructed on box
3/4 cup mini chocolate chips
24 Oreos

Frosting Ingredients:
2 blocks (8 oz) cream cheese, softened at room temperature
2 cups (4 sticks) butter
1/2 tsp salt (if using unsalted butter)
8 cups powdered sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
2-4 Tbsp heavy cream, half and half or milk
Crushed Oreos (I crushed the remaining regular sized Oreos in the package)
24 mini Oreos

Directions:
1. Prepare cake mix and stir in chocolate chips.  Line 2 cupcake pans with liners and place one Oreo in the bottom of each.  Fill each cup with batter to 2/3 full.  Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes or until toothpick inserted comes out clean.
2. Using an electric mixer, cream butter and cream cheese on medium speed until smooth.  Add salt if needed.
3. Two cups at a time, add the powdered sugar, beating after each addition.  Add vanilla and beat to combine.  If icing gets too thick to mix, add one tablespoon at a time of the milk until it is smooth again.  On the other hand, if the icing is too thin, add a half cup powdered sugar at a time until it reaches the right consistency.  Your icing should not fall off the beater right away when lifted out of the bowl.  You want a consistency that will not moved once it is piped onto the cupcakes.
4. Once the icing is the right consistency, beat on medium speed for one minute until fluffy.  Mix in crushed Oreos.
5. Pipe or spread icing onto the cupcakes and top each one with an Oreo Mini.