Truffula Tree Cupcakes Inspired by Dr. Seuss's The Lorax

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You might remember the puffy, wispy, colorful trees that are so important to the plot of The Lorax by Dr. Seuss! Check out these really fun Truffula Tree cupcakes for celebrating Dr. Seuss!

Every once in awhile, I finish up a new craft or food project for this site and I let out an audible, “EEEEeeeee!” This snack is one of those posts! I have been kicking this idea around for a few weeks now but I honestly did not think that it would come out as cute as it did.

The Lorax has a great message

Let’s back up a bit – have you ever read the book The Lorax by Dr. Seuss? Or if you haven’t read the book, perhaps you are familiar with the movie version? The main character in this story is the title role, The Lorax. The Lorax is a funny little orange guy who sports a yellow mustache and, oh yeah, he really loves trees. The trees featured in this story are bright, colorful, wispy-topped trees with bendy, striped trunks called Truffula Trees. The lesson in this book/movie is that we need to care about the Earth, the environment which of course, includes the trees.

It’s a great message and that is why this story is very popular around Earth Day celebrations.

Easy DIY cupcakes inspired by The Lorax

These DIY Truffula Tree cupcakes are honestly very easy to assemble, and you don’t even have to bake cupcakes if you don’t have the time or desire. In fact, I used store bought cupcakes and simply scraped off the store icing and replaced it with my own!

Supplies for Truffula Tree Cupcakes

You can make these fun Lorax-inspired cupcakes with these supplies:

cupcakes (un-frosted)
white frosting
food coloring (I used red, blue, green, yellow)
colorful paper straws (I used pink, blue, green, yellow)
colorful cupcake liners (I used blue, pink, green)
cotton candy (I used blue, green, pink, yellow)
small bowls (one for each color frosting)
spoons (one for each color frosting)

How to Make Truffula Tree Cupcakes

1. Place white frosting in each small bowl.

2. To each bowl of white frosting, add 3 drops of one color of food coloring. Repeat this step until you have a bowl of each color frosting that you will be using.

3. Frost the cupcakes. Place each cupcake in a colorful paper cupcake wrapper. I matched some of them to have the same color frosting and cupcake liner and then other cupcakes were mixed and matched. This created a fun color variety.

4. Next, take the straws and cut some of them at varying lengths. I cut some straws in half, cut some in thirds, and then kept a few of them full length (they became the tallest Truffula trees).

5. Cover the end of each straw with cotton candy. What worked best for me was to take an initial wad of cotton candy and to rather firmly cover the straw end. Once that was stuck on, I took whispier pieces of cotton candy and stuck those to the initial wad. Note: cotton candy starts to deteriorate when exposed to the air. I do not recommend putting the cotton candy on your straws until just before you plan to serve the cupcakes!

6. Place the straws into the cupcakes! Feel free to make some lean to one side and place other straws in straight. Truffula tree trunks bend every which way, so great creative!