Cupcakes are certainly in style for weddings these days, and I love this idea for serving them.  With a cupcake bar, guests can come up with their own combinations of cupcake, frosting, and toppings.

This cupcake bar had yellow, devil’s food and carrot cupcakes, chocolate, buttercream and coconut frosting, and toppings like sprinkles, crushed almond cookies, mini chocolate chips, walnuts and toasted coconut.  What a fun and delicious idea for a wedding, or even a birthday party or baby shower!

These treats are a fun twist on the traditional funfetti cupcake.  Grab a box of confetti cake mix and add pink lemonade drink mix, applesauce, lemon zest and some sprinkles and you’ve got a great way to end your summer (or begin your fall if you live in the north like I do).

Check out ATC sponsor Piktorama’s fun, new iPhone cases below.  Piktorama is a company that specializes in lots of fun graphics–everything from buttons to posters to iPhone cases like these.  They even have lots of cupcake art that is worth checking out.  Be sure to also take a look at some of the work that Piktorama’s owner, Amaranta Martinez, did for MTV and Nickelodeon.

Say goodbye to summer with this interesting combination: raspberry cupcakes with peanut butter buttercream.  It’s not a combination I would naturally think of, but when I got to thinking about it, peanut butter goes great with lots of other fruits (apples and bananas, for instance) and also with jams and jellies (like strawberry and grape).  So why wouldn’t peanut butter frosting make the perfect topper for a raspberry cupcake?  And just for the record, this cupcake was voted #6 on a list of the top 9 best birthday cakes and cupcakes.

Trista Sutter, former star on ABC’s The Bachelorette, has come together with Betty Crocker and concocted her own cupcake recipe using Zinfandel wine.  This TV-star-turned-cupcake queen says, “The cupcakes are a great choice if you’re preparing for a TV viewing party with your girlfriends.”

These sweet cupcakes were baked by Cupcakes with a Heart, an organization started this summer by two Yale students.  Proceeds from the cupcakes go toward different charities, and right now they support New Haven Reads, an organization that encourages literacy in New Haven.

Got a green thumb?  The summer might be winding down, but you can continue “gardening” with these creative treats. With ingredients like chewing gum, AirHeads, Jolly Ranchers, Starbursts, Tootsie Rolls, M&Ms, and chocolate-covered sunflower seeds, these garden cupcakes are sure to be a treat.  One thing is for sure: they will not fail to impress.

Conchetta Washington is a 24-year-old street artist in San Francisco.  Her company is called Conchetts, and they offer custom hand-painted items, like t-shirts, mugs and TOMS shoes (see the beautiful cupcake designs below).  Conchetta describes her designs as “whimsical, full of bold colors, swarovski crystals, and my signature cupcakes”.  Be sure and also check out her Facebook and Twitter pages.  I love her choice of colors…definitely eye-catching!

I am a huge fan of grasshopper iced coffee, so I’m pretty sure I’d also love these mint-chocolate flavored treats.  Especially with Andes mints crumbled on top.  Yum!

Did you know that August is National Peach Month?  Go celebrate by picking yourself some fresh peaches and trying out a new cupcake recipe.  (You better hurry, though, because you’re almost out of time!)  This recipe was patterned after the peach cobbler cupcake at Chattanooga Cupcakes in Tennessee.  The batter and frosting contain hints of cinnamon, and of course, peaches.

These cupcakes look beautiful, simple, and eye-catching!  Any batter and frosting will work, and you can decorate with a variety of candies.  Some suggestions: smarties, jelly beans, peanut m&ms, plain m&ms, skittles, and fondant-filled ropes.

Attention all men: Looking for a sweet way to pop the big question?  If your girlfriend has a sweet tooth, then here’s an idea that you might like, and one that could easily be done at home with some practice (since you want your cupcake to impress).

Dreamcakes in Homewood, Alabama has recently come out with the proposal cupcake.  Customers can choose from any of the bakery’s 100 flavors, and the employees will write the big question on top of the cake, along with two faux rings (unless, of course, you’d like to put the real ring on top).

Before you take a bite of these cheeseburger cupcakes, you should know that they are sweet and not salty (wouldn’t want your taste buds to get too much of a shock).  Check out the ingredients:

• Coconut shavings and green food coloring (lettuce)
• Yellow cake mix (buns)
• Chocolate cake mix (meat)
• Yellow frosting (cheese slice)
• Red frosting (ketchup)
• Sesame seeds (sesame seeds)

These plates and bowls come in beautiful pastel colors, and the bowls are shaped like cupcake liners.  I think these would be fabulous for a nice brunch or a wedding shower, and it sure beats getting out your fancy china, because these are dishwasher safe, which will save you a bunch of time for clean-up.

I found these fondant cupcakes on Pioneer Woman’s site and had to share.  Using fondant seems like it would require lots of patience, but I love how Pioneer Woman outlines the process for us step-by-step AND with pictures. These are some amazing-looking cupcakes!  The Wii cupcakes were made by Bakerella.

One of our readers shared this idea with us.  This cupcake balloon art would really impress guests at your next party.  Looks like a lot of balloons to blow up, but totally worth the effort.  I think these would make good picture backgrounds.

Butter Lane Cupcakes in New York has given us the scoop on their banana cupcakes.  Enjoy!

Are you looking for new after-school snack ideas?  Or maybe you’re just looking for an extra special treat for your kids’ first day back?  Twinkle VanWinkle has the winning treat for such an occasion: PBJ Cupcakes!  Not only do they have two all-time favorite kid ingredients (peanut butter and jelly), these cupcakes are also remarkably healthy.  Whole-wheat flour in the cake adds an extra nutritional boost, applesauce cuts back on the amount of oil required, and they are dairy-free, which means they are lower fat. The filling is quite simple: cut a hole in the center of the cupcakes and add peanut butter.  The frosting is buttercream made with strawberry preserves, which can be made healthier by using sugar-free preserves.  And of course, add some colorful sprinkles and fresh, sliced strawberry to make this treat even more enticing (as if it weren’t already!).

Chocolate and peanut butter is a winning combination in my opinion.  These chocolate mud cupcakes have dark chocolate and espresso in the batter, and the peanut butter frosting is cream-cheese based.  To top it all of are toffee peanut shards.  Yum, yum, yum!

I don’t know about you, but once fall weather sets in, I enjoy grabbing a warm beverage and curling up on the couch to do a little knitting.  Even though fall is still a little way away, the rainy weather and cooler temperatures this week have gotten me thinking ahead.  I found this free knitting pattern, and it looks pretty simple.  You could sew it onto a t-shirt as suggested, or you could dream up some other ideas for it.

I always love flipping through an issue of Real Simple magazine.  They always have great ideas for making life simpler, and it turns out they also know how to simplify cupcakes.  These Short Stack Cupcakes are made by simply slicing a cupcake into 3 layers, adding whipped cream between each layer, and topping it all off with your favorite berries.

This cupcake carrier carousel is designed like a giant cupcake that stores 24 cupcakes (3 stacking inserts hold 8 cupcakes apiece).  The inserts can also be used as serving stands.  This would be a great and compact way of taking cupcakes to a party or other event.

One of my all-time favorite desserts is a Mississippi Mud Cake.  It’s hard to beat chocolate, pecans and marshmallows, all in the same dessert.  I found this recipe on Southern Living’s website, and it sounds delicious.

I’m not the biggest fan of sushi, but I could definitely go for these sushi cupcakes.  They are vanilla cupcakes cut into balls, iced, and rolled in white sprinkles.  Fondant was used for the fish, wasabi, and ginger.

Down here in the South, we had a record-breaking high of 110 degrees today.  With the scorching heat, an evening cup of coffee didn’t sound particularly enticing tonight, but these espresso-laden ice cream cupcakes from Everyday with Rachael Ray sure would hit the spot!

Finely ground ice-cream cones and butter form the crust, and chocolate, almonds, coffee-flavored ice cream, and chocolate-covered espresso beans make up the filling.  The topping is a smooth mixture of whipping cream, confectioners’ sugar, and chocolate shavings.

One cool (no pun intended) thing about these cupcakes is that they can be frozen for up to three days, so if you are making them for a party, you can do all the work ahead of time.  Or, if you’re just making them for yourself, you can enjoy them for several days (that is, if you can keep yourself from eating them all at once).