How to make the cupcake tower.

I had a friend with a circular saw cut 4 circles out of a thicker particle board that were 6", 9", 12" & 16".  I painted them white mostly because you will see the bottoms and the edges (because the ribbon doesn't fit perfectly.)  I use a pumpkin can, green bean can and a cream of mushroom can for the pillars.  If you wanted it to be more fancy you could try using glasses or vases as long as their sturdy because the boards are pretty heavy.  Then to cover the boards I have used tissue paper, wrapping paper, scrapbook paper and tablecloths.  The easiest way to do it is trace the board onto paper and then cut out.  I piece the scrapbook paper together first before tracing the big one because 1 sheet isn't big enough.  Then I use double sided tape to adhere it.  I use glue dots to adhere the ribbon (5/8" in size) along the edges and to cover the cans.  I only use 2 dots for the ribbon along the edges because the glue dots make the ribbon pucker so you want that part to be in back.  I have also used paper to wrap the cans and glue dots work well for that too.   

More than meets the eye!

My son's 4th birthday. The night before I piped the autobot symbols onto wax paper with royal icing and then carefully (they were very thin and fragile) peeled them off and placed them on the cupcakes as I was frosting them the day of. I covered the cake tower boards with part of the table cloth and wrapped the cans in ribbon.

The Cupcake Tower!

I did these for Kelly's baby shower.  I used the almond cream cheese frosting with strawberry and vanilla cupcakes.  I covered the tower boards with tissue paper that I put a laminate over, and wrapped the edge with a ribbon to match.  And the cans I covered in ribbon.  The tags on top are just some scrapbook tags that I taped onto sucker sticks.