This weekend I had the pleasure of attending my first Meet-Up with the All About Food in Tallahassee group. Having found out about the group from a TNG (Tallahassee Nerds & Geeks) member, that makes MeetUp.com 2 for 2 meeting fabulous folks.
As you might have guessed, the theme, flavor and activity of choice for the meetup was cupcakes.
We had at least 60 decorated cupcakes by day's end.
Our hostess is quite the cake decorator, herself, and I was a happy helper monkey busting out my old supplies and my somewhat-rusty piping skills to make my own creations as well as help others get the hang of things with theirs.
It almost makes me want to teach for Wilton again.
Except for the whole time thing. Or, rather, the lack thereof.
But for a day’s outing, it was a nice return to my old creative stomping grounds.
To host your own cupcake afternoon, here’s the skinny on how our hostess made it so very enjoyable.
1. Start with your supplies.
Steff had plenty of decorating tools for folks to use and the ones I brought made a good back-up when the frosting started flying.
Tables are required since the cakes have to sit somewhere; she put a cover on her pool table as a second table to allow plenty of table-space for everyone.
The table laden with supplies and inspiration, just waiting for us to start.
2. Gather the troops and get them to bring things.
Several people brought un-iced cupcakes and a few people brought cookies. Others brought candies and toppings to be used in decorating.
Of course, meetups can’t live by sugar alone! There was also plenty of savory snacking to be had to fend off the sugar coma pure icing would have otherwise caused.
Savory foods laid out for snacking
This meant that we didn’t actually start decorating for a while, instead we had the usual nosh and nose-around-people’s-lives until the last folks had arrived.
3. Give ’em their marching orders and let the wild cupcaking begin!
A few words of guidance from Steff and it was pretty much catch-as-catch can. The cupcakes were moved around to make room for people to work, tools were grabbed and the icing started to flow.
Piping fishnet stockings onto a cookie.
One enterprising attendee made peanut butter cookie people (and his own cutter/mold, too) and decided to make both the girls and the boys. Alas, when presented with such a start, there was nothing else to do but dress the boobalicious peanut butter girl in some fishnets and lingerie.
Then someone wanted some guidance building a cupcake pooch from one of the books available for inspiration. She did such an amazing job–I was so proud.
An excellent student and her creation
4. After about 4 hours, send everyone home with as many cupcakes as they can carry!
Oh, there were so many cupcakes. In addition to the 60 or so that were decorated, there were easily 3 dozen that left as naked as they arrived. They were divvied up and everyone who wanted had a little something extra to bring home.
Tip: Disposable carry-out containers are available at most warehouse and restaurant supply stores. Having some extras on hand for these sorts of things never hurts.
An afternoon spent cupcaking, cooking, or crafting with friends is a fantastic way to pass a day. And if you don’t have a group of like-minded individuals to do that with, already, check out MeetUp.com and find some new ones.
To see the rest of my photos from the day, check out my Google+ album.