12 Easiest Christmas Cupcakes For Kids

Christmas Cupcake Decorating Ideas

It is SO MUCH FUN to decorate Christmas cookies or make a Christmas cupcake with kids – for many of us it’s a Christmas tradition!

But if you’ve attempted this before, you know as well as I do that the key to keeping this tradition light hearted and fun (instead of becoming one of those micro-management-mom sessions where the kids just watch you do their project) is to choose Christmas cupcake decorating ideas that are SIMPLE and not picky – so the kids can actually take part in the decorating too.

Simple Christmas Cupcakes to Make With Kids:

Any of the following Christmas cupcake designs can be more or less replicated just by looking at the pictures – without a high cake decorating skill level.

Whether you’re making sweet treats to enjoy on Christmas Eve or take along to a holiday party this Christmas season, these easy Christmas cupcake ideas will be a HIT.

There’s no complex instructions to follow – show them to your kiddos so they know what you’re going for – but let go of perfection and have fun with it!

Since the decorating is 90% of the fun, I suggest you use your favorite box of cake mix to keep this project super simple.

MOST of our Christmas cupcake for kids ideas include BIG piles of frosting (and if it was me, I’d use cream cheese frosting wherever white frosting is suggested), so that they are just as much fun to EAT as they are to MAKE – and that’s really what’s going to make these cupcakes winners this year.

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Reindeer Cupcakes

Using any types of cupcake (vanilla or chocolate or whatever), you can ice them with brown icing and add a few basic embellishments to create reindeer!

Pretzels make cute antlers, white icing can be used for the snout and eyes (or you can use candy eyes – you can get little bags of them in the baking isle), and a brown m&m or a red m&m can be used for the nose. (Red m&ms make Rudolph! lol.)

Snowman Cupcakes

These are maybe my personal favorite – wouldn’t these snowman cupcakes spread holiday cheer at any Christmas party?

Marshmallows sitting on top of piles of white frosting make cute melted looking snowmen. The less tidy the white frosting, the more melty the snowmen look – so it’s no real big deal if your kids are less than precise with their frosting piles.

Use black cookie icing to draw arms and face on, and add three candy balls for buttons. The carrot nose can be made of orange cookie icing, or orange candy.

Christmas Wreath Cupcakes

First, cover your cupcake in a thin layer of white icing.

Next, use a piping bag to create a circle of green rosettes around the edge of the cupcake.

(Older kids will have no problem decorating these Christmas cupcakes on their own, but very little hands might need help with the piping bag.)

Embellish the wreaths however you like! Use any candy or cookie sprinkles (from the baking isle) to decorate the wreaths. These below use gold + blue stars and red bows – super simple, but totally festive.

Hot Chocolate / Eggnog Cupcake

Or maybe it’s apple cider? Either way, this is a festive Christmas-y looking drink, with the cupcake making up the “mug” and a candy cane for the handle.

A pile of white frosting finished off with some gold baking embellishments from the baking isle are super simple but definitely creative.

Santa Hat Cupcakes

There’s something SO appealing about being able to create this Christmas cupcake for kids with NOTHING but frosting!

If you have frosting and food coloring at home, you can make these Santa cupcakes without any extra shopping, and little hands will be able to help.

Top your cupcakes with red frosting, and add white frosting around the edges, with a dab on top – the tip of Santa’s hat! (You could also use mini marshmallows to make the hat trim!)

Mistletoe Cupcakes

You can cut the mistletoe leaves out of green fondant, or you can use candies from the store. Any red candy (MnMs or the like) will make perfect mistletoe berries that your kids will be able to add to the cupcakes themselves!

If you make these out of bran muffins, they’d make a great Christmas breakfast!

Make sure to use a big pile of frosting to “build” your mistletoe plants on.

Penguin Cupcake

Penguins are my favorite Christmas animal lol. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and penguins are my daughter’s favorite animal period.

So, of course, Penguin cupcakes are a must at Christmas time!

Get the full instructions for these adorable cupcakes here.

Polar Bear Cupcakes

I’m not entirely sure that grey bears are Christmas-esque, but you could make these little bear cupcakes as polar bears – use white icing and sprinkles, and then they’d be Christmas-y for sure!

Christmas Lights Cupcakes

A pile of white frosting, a simple line of black frosting winding it’s way around the mound of white frosting, and smarties (or MnMs) for the “Christmas lights”. Your kids will love to be the ones who get to add the “lights” to these Christmas light cupcakes!

You can read full instructions for decorating these cupcakes at bakedbree.com.

Grinch Cupcakes

In our house, we have a tradition with the kids of watching the Grinch and eating a finger-food supper on the floor in the living room. This year I thought it’d be fun to add Grinch cupcakes for dessert!

Add a couple drops of green food coloring to a box of white Betty Crocker cake mix (or whatever your favorite boxed cake mix is) to create green cupcakes to use as the base, and decorate the cupcakes with Santa hats on top of more green frosting. You can get instructions for Grinch cupcakes here.

Christmas Tree Cupcakes

I think my favorite thing about this Christmas cupcake for kids is that you can decorate the tiny “trees” however you want!

If you use a piping bag to create tiny “trees” on top your cupcake, let your kids add candy or cookie sprinkles etc. as the “tree” décor. You could even get small star candies for the top of the tree! Don’t worry about making perfect Christmas trees – even haphazard trees can make adorable Christmas cupcakes.

Snowflake Cupcakes

To keep it SUPER simple, just decorate the cupcakes with snowflake candy and glittery / metallic cookie decorating candies. It can be tempting to be over-ly involved, but just put the candies a small bowl and let the kids add as many as they want!

Which of these fun Christmas cupcake ideas will you try this year?

Your kids will love to make (and eat) ANY of these cute Christmas cupcake for kids ideas, and best of all, you’ll be making magical memories with them.