Back to School Graham Cracker Snacks - and Other Lego Themed Ideas PLUS Giveaway

Hey Everyone! So it's that time of year again when I constantly ask "Where the heck did the summer go!" I woke up today and it's even a little chilly outside.  Did you ever think you'd be longing for the hot and humid days of summer? It feels like we hardly had any and I most def am wishing for more summer.

And it's amazing that in my FB feed, there are so many 1st day of school pics already.  My 3 kiddos don't start until September after Labor Day, but that's really only a couple weeks away.  Please time, please SLOW DOWN! 

OK time won't slow down, I get it, that's fine - so in protest I'm celebrating every single day with treats.  Well maybe not every single day, because I have a day job and all, but how about something to get the kiddos excited for school? And if Lego won't get them excited (at least if they are like my kids), then I don't know what will.  Make some edible Lego inspired back to school snacks - all you need is some chocolate candy wafers and graham crackers.  

Directions for assembly are easy:

1. Make your candy minifigs (see tutorial here)
2. Open a pack of graham crackers and break into squares
3. Using more melted chocolate, attach minifig to graham cracker
4. Using more candy melt, write phrase on squares (put candy melt into zip lock bag, microwave until melted well, snip an end of the zip lock bag and pipe)
5. Add a contrasting color candy melt around the border of the graham cracker (just to neaten them up, not needed of course!)
6. Add heart sprinkle onto lego minifig

All you really need are some fun molds.  Like this one:

Or this one:

Or maybe this one:

Or how about a pack of all 3?

I know, you totally want these right? Well guess what? You can enter to win a pack of all 3 of these molds in my "Summer's Not Over Yet" Giveaway.  Enter to win a box of these fun mold/ice cube trays thanks to a new friend over at Amazon.  Actually we're giving away 1 box to 3 readers!!! WOO!!! You can see the molds/ice cube trays over at this Amazon listing. 

To Enter the Giveaway: 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

There will be 3 winners of the giveaway picked via Rafflecopter.  Open to US residents only.  Giveaway ends August 23rd 12 AM EST.

GOOD LUCK!

Here are some other fun treat ideas to use the molds for.  Use your imagination!

A tutorial on making the candy mini figures using a silicone mold:

Chocolate Covered Lego Minifig Cake Bites (using the larger minifig mold)

Lego Minifig Frozen Pudding Snacks

Lego Frozen Yogurt Pops

Lego Halloween Minifig Pops

Lego Cupcakes

Lego Minifig Cards or Valentines

Or just use them to make some fun chocolates to snack on! Use your favorite chocolate or add some sprinkles to leftover melted chocolate/candy melt to the molds and you've got some really easy and super fun snacks.

And of course the Back to School Graham Cracker Treats

"Nice try mom!"

halloween lego minifig pops & cupcakes....!

...so halloween had to be one of my least favorite holidays when i was a little kid....the thought of going up to strangers houses...knocking and then asking for a treat was kinda like a mini panic attack to someone who was a wee bit on the shy side as a kid....now that's no problem at all...only took 30 or so years to get over that (and working in the corporate world kinda forces you out of comfort zones anyway).....

.....that said halloween is really fun now with my kiddos and they love it....they are a little cautious as well...but they quickly loose any fear when it comes to gettin' some free candy....and the treats out in the blogosphere are pretty sweet around halloween time too....!

....and i think i've mentioned it plenty of times before....but we have lego freaks living here....so i knew these would be a hit around this particular homestead......

.....to make the lego minifigs..... you'll need this:

...it's a silicone ice cube tray but it works really well with candy melts/wafers.....and if you are crazy like me...you may take time to sketch out your master plan (does anyone else do this or am i the only looney bin?)....

 

...start with the colors you want the basic lego minifig to be....you can find the process for making these candy lego dudes here...just remember you need to work kinda fast and have the colors ready to go at the same time for each minifig......

....once hardened....add the details for the halloween characters....i used more candy melt (add wafers to a zip lock bag....nuke until just melted and snip off the tiniest edge so you can "pipe" on finer detail....i also had some left over royal icing from other projects and tinted it black to do some of the face detail (like on frankenstein's monster's face and belt, dracula's hair)....other detail is candy melt (devil tail/eyes/horns, dracula's cape/fangs, skeleton face and bones, mummy eyes/mouth, zombie blood) or you can also try the food writers (i used this for the mummy cloth lines and zombie eyes/mouth and pumpkin head eyes)...really i just experimented until i got the effect i was looking for.....oh and for the bride of frankenstein...you need to add extra white candy melt over the legs to make it look like a dress and use black and white candy melt for her hair.....

 ...the kiddos loved these as mini pops...but you can also use them for cupcake toppers...or any other lego treats you can think of....i've used them on cakes...as valentine's day treats....and of course as cupcake toppers as well.....this mold has gotten a ton of mileage out of it for the 10 bucks or so that it cost....!

 

....and you get some pretty neat looking edible lego minifig dudes just for halloween....!!

....anyhoo hope you like them and thanks so much for stopping by....don't forget to enter to win the "halloween treat making care package" too---it's open til Oct 8th!...have a GREAT week!

Linking up to these cool sites (go visit or link up your own neat stuff!):

Tidy Mom's I'm Loving It

Works for Me Wednesday

Made by You Monday

Hoosier Homemade - Making your House a Home

Creative Me Monday

A Well Seasoned Life

Lady Behind the Curtain-Cast Party Wednesday

Jane Deere's Fusion Friday

Carolyn's Homework Today's Assignment Be Inspired

Friday Potluck

Share Awesomeness Thursdays

Tatertots and Jello - Weekend Wrap Up Party

Tasty Tuesdays

Mouthwatering Monday

Alli n Son - Sweet Tooth Friday
Wickedly Creative Halloween Ideas
Midwestern Sewing Girl - Everything Halloween

candy lego men tutorial....!

....so after posting the lego dude valentines and the lego dude cupcakes.....i've gotten quite a few comments or emails about how to make them.....so here you go....my first "official" tutorial....(although i usually include how i do stuff in all my posts)....

....start with a lego minifigure ice cube mold....i got mine from an official lego store (for some reason my boys including the 41 year old seem to love that place...!)...but you can find them other places online or ebay probably has them too.....

....and you need candy melts of course...i use wilton but whatever kind you like and colors you want your dudes....for these i went with the traditional yellow, red, and blue.....i add mine to regular zip lock bags...and nuke them in the microwave until just melted...(about 30 secs or so depending on your microwave)....don't over melt....you want it just fluid enough to "pipe"...snip off an end of the bag to make a small tip....the key is to have all 3 colors ready to go at the same time and you have to work a little fast (so apologies for the kinda crappy photo pics!)....

....i start with the head....fill up about half way....don't go past the "ridge" between the head and the body or you will get the color over flowing into the body when it hardens.....

....then fill half way with a different color for the body and same with the pants...trying not to go past the "ridge" separating each section.....(if you are really motivated you can color the hands the same color as the head....but i'm usually not that motivated)...

....i stop once 4 are half way filled and then tap the mold on the counter to get the colors even....then fill the rest of the mold with the same colors again.....

....once the molds are filled....tap on the counter again....pretty hard to get make sure there are no air bubbles and to fill in all the sections of the mold....(you usually don't see the back of the lego guys as much so i don't worry about how that looks as much....you can see the colors run a bit into the different sections here)....

....i put them in the freezer for about 10 minutes then pop them out of the silicone mold (it's really easy to pop them out---never had any break doing this).....

....and you get an edible lego minifig dude.....

....or multiple lego mini fig dudes....!

....if you make these they usually get a pretty cool reaction from the kiddos or lego fans in general.....these were for a bake sale at the 6 year olds school yesterday...a cake with the lego dudes and some candy lego bricks i found at our local candy shop....

.....and cupcakes of course all wrapped up and ready to go....!

.....hope this is helpful and if you do make the lego guys....send a pic and let me know how they turned out....!

tidy mom

a month of cupcakes!

...the wrap up for Hoosier Homemade's Cupcake Challenge....although I wasn't really planning on doing all the cupcakes for this challenge, it kinda fit in with other stuff going on that just *needed* cupcakes too...the theme was summertime fun.....

Week 1 Flavor: What flavor screams Summertime Fun to you? Create a cupcake with that flavor...watermelon cupcakes!

Week 2 Event/Activities: Did you visit the zoo or maybe go to the beach this Summer? Create a cupcake that shows the fun you had this Summer....baseball cap cupcakes!

Week 3 Cake Mix: Turn an ordinary cake mix into a special cupcake. Create a special flavor using a cake mix, post the recipe....flav-or-ice cupcakes!

Week 4 Candy: It’s all about Candy this week! Create a cupcake, using the Summertime Fun theme, using candy as decorations....lego dude cupcakes!

...this was really a lot of fun, and a distraction for me having to think about doing that iron man cake at the end of august (see previous post)....!

legos legos and more legos...!

...that's what we do around here...especially this summer when school is out....i wonder how many of these....

we have...its got to be in the gazillions and if not it sure feels that way....i used to try to keep sets together (me and my type A personality and all), but now they just end up in the lego ether as we call it (along with the hundreds of dollars spent on them!)....i have to say the kids are really creative with them, so guess that's a plus...

...these were for the lego fanatic(s) around here...not sure who's the bigger lego maniac, the 6 y/o or the 40 y/o but either way they were fun to make and definitely had lots of candy and sugar to keep a bunch of 5 and 6 year olds going for a play date/birthday party.

...the lego dudes are made from candy melts (each color zapped in a plastic zip lock in the microwave for a minute or so) then snip a corner and "pipe" the candy into the lego dude ice cube tray, and freeze for a few minutes....you end up with a bunch of these:

...used a chocolate cake recipe (because most kids like chocolate cupcakes, right?) and topped with vanilla buttercream tinted yellow...edged in mini m&m's...oh yeah, also before baking added one of these inside each:

....which ended up looking like this:

...it gave the cupcakes a neat texture thing with some salty going on...i would have added more than 1 but wasn't sure how it would have turned out and since they were for 5-6 year olds I didn't want to chance the..."ewwww, i found something in my cupcake, yuk!" factor....in the end they were pretty tasty!

week 4 hoosier homemade's cupcake challenge