Cupcake Party

Cook up some fun at this baking party. Let guests bake and decorate their own desserts, then send them home with everything to create their own cupcakes at home.

Materials: 3 plastic foam discs, a glue gun, a serrated knife, three 12x12 scrapbook pages, a paper cutter with scoring blade, silk flowers, wire cutters, tulle and other embellishments.

Directions: Stack the plastic foam discs, and adhere them with hot glue. Use a serrated knife to shave away some foam to shape the stack of discs into a cupcake shape. Use the paper cutter to trim your scrapbook paper to the height of the tower of discs. Then use the scoring blade to move across each page, scoring sheets in 1/2-inch increments. Fold the paper accordion-style along the score lines. Then glue the first page to the side of the foam tower. To start the next page, glue the edge of the paper over the last pleat of the first page you glued to the disc. Then wrap the second page around, securing it with hot glue. Finish the cupcake wrapper with the third piece, folding the edges on each side over a pleat. Clip floral stems short with wire cutters, and insert them into the foam, covering the top edge of the paper liner. Work inward from the perimeter, keeping stems longer toward the center to make a domed effect. Finish the arrangement with tulle, ribbons, or other embellishments.

Let guests do the decorating for you -- then dig into their own creations.

To dress up the cupcakes, have several shades of frosting in pastry bags so guests can add a flourish. Provide icing flowers for the kids to use, rather than to let them pipe them on.

Sprinkles give the kids plenty of options for fixing up their cupcakes

Give guests everything they need to re-create the magic at home. Fill white paper lunch bags with pink paper shreds, cupcake liners, sprinkles, and your favorite cupcake and frosting recipes.

Tie a few marshmallow sticks together to make a sweet post-party treat.

A baking party requires lots of cupcake liners. Use the extras to make a pretty garland. With white yarn and a needle, string regular sized cupcake liners, mini cupcake liners, coffee filters, and small doilies together. A random pattern is best, so have fun using all of the items in whatever order you'd like. Turn cupcake liners and coffee filters in both directions to keep them from nesting and to make the garland look fuller.

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