Minion cupcakes, embracing non violent shows for my children

My children have been on a minion spree lately and love love love when I play this video from Youtube which has the minions being minions to "Happy". Having 2 boys, its hard to find shows they want to watch and characters they want to be like that don't have violence in them. Super Heros are great and all but I've found by limiting those toys and shows they behave better. Children love to copy what they see, so when a non violent movie comes out I like to think of fun ways to encourage it. So insert these fun cupcakes which I found on Pinterest...

.........and thought hmmm easy enough... But before you tell your children and start to make awesome minions let me share with you what worked and what didn't!
To start I used the following ingredients:

Cup cake wrappers
funfetti cupcake mix ( or any mix and what ever the mix calls for)
Funfetti frosting ( or any frosting, also my boys alway like to help me color the frosting and or batter with food color its great for preschoolers to learn what happens if mommy/daddy puts in blue and he/she puts in red!)
twinkies one box is enough for 20 cupcakes
altoids or smarties for the eyes
black gel to draw the face - Here is where I ran into issues... Not sure if the gel was just not good I tried wilton and cake mate or it's the warm climate I live in.... I ended up making candy melts from chocolate chips, however it's easier to buy candy melts in black or dark brown *candy melts can be found in crafts stores, walmart, and bakery supply stores

* make your own by using chocolate chips and adding oil, be sure to melt chocolate in a double broiler, don't use direct heat!*

Ziploc bags or piping bags
tips are great but I didn't have any handy so they can be made without them if you are in a pinch!

Bake cupcakes as directed * Tip put half of the mix in a ziploc bag and cut a tiny part of the corner off, this makes

filling the cupcake cups easier and less messy.

make them about 2/3 full A flat top is easier than a rounded big cupcake

Let them cool

while they are baking and cooling grab some wax paper, paper plate or even a napkin to practice faces on

Once completely cool frost and sprinkle them

( I also used a ziploc to frost them)

Now as I said above the gel wasn't working.. It looked great at first then it started to melt and I had some sad Minons

If you have chocolate melts follow the instructions to melt them, microwaving is super fast
cute twinkies in half
put the melted chocolate in a ziploc or piping bag and cut a small corner
*make a dot about the same size as your white candy ( or two dots mine were all one eyed minions) press the candy down so that the chocolate can be seen around the candy and made a dot in the center of the eye
* draw a line going back on each side of the eye for the goggle straps
make a mouth

*To help the twinkie stay on the cupcake put a quarter size amount on the bottom of the twinkie then push down on the cupcake.

For the hair draw a few lines or use black twisters/redvines or chocolate sprinkles

Let me know if you have tried these and if they worked or didn't work for you, also do you limit they shows your children watch? comment below!