cupcake tier

I really wanted to have a cute cupcake display holder for Owen's party, but when I started pricing them, I realized quickly this was going to have to be a DIY project!  So here are the supplies you need.  Pay attention to the words, not this first picture as I changed my mind about using the tuna cans:

• 2 cardboard boxes (I have lots of diaper boxes that worked perfectly)
• 5 soup cans that are all the same size
• white card stock paper (or whatever color paper you want to cover your tiers with)
• hot glue gun
• glue stick (like the Elmer's glue sticks you used in kindergarten)
• ribbon

Step 1: cut out 6 cardboard circles (2 of each size).  I just used 3 different size bowls, traced them, and cut them out.  Ouch, cutting cardboard with scissors will definitely leave indents in your hand.  Can you tell that I should've cut my smallest circle, umm, smaller.  I was too lazy to fix it.

Step 2: glue the 2 same-sized circles together.  You're doing this just to add extra durability to each tier.  I just used my hot glue gun!

Step 3: cover your cans with paper.  I cut my paper the height of the can and hot glued the seam of the paper so I could easily slide the paper covering on and off.

Step 4:  while you're cutting paper, trace your 3 circles and cut out paper just slightly bigger than them.  You can use any paper you want to show as the main trays.  I decided I just wanted to use white.  Set these aside for use in a later step.

Step 5: hot glue your ribbon along the edge of the cardboard circles to cover the ugliness.  I hot glued a couple inches at a time.

 

Step 6: turn your bottom tier over.  I wanted to add extra stability so I hot glued all my cans on.  You'll notice that I slipped the white paper off before I hot glued and then slipped them back on.  No real idea why I did this.  Ha.

 Step 7: Hot glue one covered can to the bottom of the top and middle tier.

 

Step 8: Turn over your tiers and glue your paper covering in place.  I found that hot glue and paper didn't quite mix.  It made the paper quite lumpy.  So I broke out the good old Elmer's glue stick and glued my paper down with that.

Step 9: You may choose to assemble when you are at the place of your party.  I just wanted to get it done and them transported it in a laundry basket.  Line up all your seams and hot glue the bottoms of the cans in place for the top 2 tiers.  And you're done!

Step 10 (optional, and sorry no pictures of this step): make cupcake toppers.  I took a 1" scrapbooking circle punch and used about 10 different papers I'd been using throughout his party.  I punched out 2 little circles per cupcake.  I then put hot glue on one of the circles, placed a toothpick on top, then covered it with a different color piece of paper.  Simple little circle toppers that just added some color.

Step 11: Bake cupcakes.  I tried multiple recipes for "fancy gourmet cupcakes." Failure.  My sister's quote after tasting one batch was "there's a reason box mixes sell so well."  So that's what I ended up doing.  I also used icing from a can.  Gasp.  But I put the icing in a ziploc bag, and cut the end off to make a pastry icing bag.  I just went around in a circle.  I thought they looked pretty gourmet for their price tag of under $8.

Step 12: Have your sister arrange the cupcakes and take beautiful pictures.  Then eat and enjoy.

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